By Murray Grimwood*
Simeon Brown, our new Minister for Energy, has an impossible task ahead of him; on a par with King Canute (reportedly) attempting to stem the tide. Energy – as the Minister will find, but for political reasons is unlikely to articulate – is a slippery beast; we make our understanding of it no easier by using inaccurate words like ‘generate’ and ‘fund’ and ‘consume’.
Simply put
In simple terms, energy cannot be created or destroyed – but you don’t get something for nothing; every time you extract work from an energy flow you leave it degraded. The ultimate degradation is low-grade heat – too low to use. This is the heat from a cup of coffee left in a room – it is still there in the room, but it would take more energy to scoop it back up, than would be scooped. This inexorable process is known as the Second Law of Thermodynamics – which every budding Minister for Energy needs to comprehend.
Given the last paragraph, it obviously follows that the ratio of the energy required to obtain energy, compared to the energy thus obtained, is important. Indeed it has to be positive, to be bothered doing. All life-forms and all powered machines run at less than 100% efficiency and therefore need more energy in, than they turn into work. The ratio is short-hand-notated as EROEI – Energy Return on Energy Invested. The loss, of course, manifests as low-grade heat; your sweat, your radiator’s warmth.
Also, given that structural decay is inexorable and compounding, maintenance energy-requirements increase per item, over time. That plots as an exponential curve compounded by the exponential growth in the item-count.
Thus far
The history of humanity and energy has been one of us using more; exponentially more. The trend has been from firewood to coal to oil and gas, paralleled by efficiencies in applying energy to work. But at no stage has demand reversed because of efficiencies, nor have ‘renewables’ displaced global fossil energy dissipation (conventionally called consumption or use) – we’ve merely added them. And we have burned the best of the fossil stock; it’s gone. Generally speaking every ‘next’ option is of lower EROEI; alternatively, this can be thought of as ‘is of higher entropy’.
The regime we ran was to obtain as much energy as we could, as fast as we could, to do as much work as we could. We didn’t call that an energy frenzy, though; we called it economic growth and pursued it with willing blindness.
Inevitably the peak of net energy-flow would cause the cessation, then reversal, of said economic growth and the Minister’s cohort appears to be the one – there was always going to be one – caught holding the poisoned chalice. They have no excuse either; Labour’s ‘wellbeing’ initiative was on the right track; to quash those advances was a waste of the little time remaining (but to be fair, due to being too anthropocentric, much of the wellbeing initiative still fell short of qualifying as properly sustainable).
We have always fought over energy and wars are usually won by those showing up with the most; essentially throwing more projectiles carrying more explosive further/faster than their opposition. What we haven’t done until now, is to fight over who gets the last – albeit increasingly the worst – half of the most-concentrated and multi-useful energy-stock we have ever tapped into. This aggression will not go away unless we nuke ourselves into oblivion, or fight ourselves to a standstill. Put another way; 2025 is not coming back.
Brown’s appointment – likely reasons for
Nact have been caught ideologically flat-footed. In attempting defense of economic growth – getting back on track – they had to turn to the highest EROEI, lowest entropy energy sources. The fact that those were reducing both in availability and quality, was overlooked. Had to be overlooked. It was an approach that was doomed to fail; doubling-times being what the are and the little orb photographed from Artemis being what it is. It follows that decisions made would be found wanting – and it would seem that we will see the quiet reversal of the LNG pipedream; presumably an easier sell if coming from a different talking head.
Secondly, it may just have occurred to them that energy is perhaps important. High Priests from the church of economics – like Nordhaus – may well opine that this or that is a small percentage of GDP (energy included) and therefore get-by-without-able. But without energy no work is done – a fact which the threat of supply cessation has made clear. Besides being essential, energy is not fungible and what started as an ideological belief based entirely on the view seen through a chosen small rearview-mirror, has run into the rocks of reality.
What the Minister needs to factor in
It may be an ‘energy portfolio’; but as we are witnessing, geopolitics, scarcity and sheer human overshoot, are the backdrop. Making calls – like that idea of having an LNG terminal – in the face of non-supply, is no more useful than cargo-cultism.
This means the Minister must address a future-attainable maximum rate of turning energy into work; overlay that with material availability (our best-taken-first approach means that any given resource-residual will be ‘worse’) and guess a per-head rate of consumption/use. This will give him a ball-park figure for the human carrying-capacity of New Zealand, ex fossil input. So he will be advising his fellow Ministers of Immigration, Agriculture, Health, Local Government – indeed the ramifications are universal.
Beyond that is a Boolean algebra slash game theory tangle of options; based largely on what can – but more importantly what cannot – be maintained ex fossil input. Roads? (they’re made of, and laid by, fossil feedstock). The grid? (nobody has maintained one ex fossil energy). Cities? (how big a collection can be supplied and serviced, food in and wastes away, ex fossil energy?)
En passant, is the problem of transitioning from here to there. There is little point in adding to the collection of fossil-dependent infrastructure and plant – which is just about everything. That would be a waste of the remaining fossil resource, and by implication, the remaining lead-time. For instance; asking whether the Onslow battery proposition is viable depends on having a prior answer as to whether we can maintain the existing grid, ex fossil input?
Resilience/buffering/capacitance
Our trend has been towards specialisation and increasingly-discretionary complexity. One does not need automatically-switched lights or windscreen-wipers, nor GPS, to drive to the supermarket (itself a specialised piece of complexity dependent on fossil energy). As the pressure comes on, complexity will be abandoned in favour of simplicity; specialisation will be displaced by general knowledge. A unique feature of the coming transition will be triage: never before will there have been such a fleet of stranded-asset ‘stuff’; enough to cannibalise for decades.
Local and many – as the internet has proven – is more resilient than central and few. Transmission, which in any form needs energy to achieve, is reduced with localism and failures are partial rather than universal. Local PV (solar) and local hydro are therefore no-brainers; local wind perhaps less assured (depending on site).
Ultimately, solar capture per local acre is the energy key. It can only be used once, whether for food-production, biosphere continuance, or for conversion into (non-food) energy – typically into firewood and other biofuels, or into electricity. Within this limitation is our long-term safe operating space, remembering that the list of things that have never been built ex fossil energy, includes geothermal and nuclear power-plants…
Conclusion
The pace and scale of the change required energy-wise – and thus everything-wise - is far beyond the limitations of the Overton Window vis-à-vis voter ignorance. Thus the comment made at the beginning; the Minister has an impossible task. Moreover, it is increasingly likely that moves and plans that are made, get overtaken by events (as we are witnessing). But it is still valid to play the best cards possible, in sequence, even though the hand you’ve been dealt is less than optimal. Any move in the direction of resilience; of invulnerability, has to be a winner. Good luck Mr. Brown; this tanker will self-destruct in five seconds…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnot_cycle
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_4du5qkyEA&t=931s
https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/resources
*Murray Grimwood comments on interest.co.nz as powerdownkiwi.
104 Comments
Readers should no doubt have noticed that this sort of narrative is almost entirely absent from the people who actually work with energy systems. Economists and scientists don’t support it. Governments don’t plan around it. Even the oil industry, which could find it beneficial to talk up scarcity, doesn’t support it.
Of course, this could be because of a wild conspiracy. They may be hiding the truth from the people. Let the people enjoy themselves before the inevitable apocalypse.
But how likely is that?
Quite unlikely when you consider that this narrative is full of the following:
Claims not supported by energy‑systems research.
Category errors (physics = economics).
Thermodynamics theatre - using physics as a rhetorical shield.
False analogies (finite tank = global system).
Unsupported assertions such as maintenance costs rise exponentially, decay compounds exponentially, infrastructure cannot be maintained without fossil fuels.
Misuse of EROEI
Ignoring substitution, technology, and system dynamics.
Treating history as destiny.
Predetermined conclusion - that collapse is inevitable (no data).
Ok, so now back up all of YOUR claims with some actual data or references. Or better yet, write an opinion piece supporting your position and get it published on here.
The claim-points are actually own-goals, if pursued.
Somebody else put this link up on the other thread, it's worth listening to the whole thing:
What Happens When the Oil Stops Flowing | Frankly 136
Yeh tend to agree with Zach on this one
Not sure that I'm buying the “thermodynamics = collapse” jump here
Looks like starting with a limits-to-growth view and then working backwards to make everything fit
Energy constraints are obviously real, but we've had those forever in different forms, and what tends to happen is things get pricier, slower, or move about....not that the whole system just falls over
If it was that deterministic would expect to see it pretty clearly in how things are actually playing out, rather than needing a physics lesson to explain why collapse is inevitable
You might get something from this:
Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist | Do the Math
from a Physics Professor. An oldie but a goodie.
Yeh read it
I get the finite vs exponential point
Anyway still seems like there’s a step missing between that and “therefore collapse” tho
Thats the bit I’m not really seeing in how things are actually playing out
Good question. And thanks for bothering :)
Atop the energy extraction-growth (it was exponential; applying coal energy to pump coal-mines dry was one of the early moves, locomotives to transport it another) of the last 200 years, we have constructed a token-trading accountancy system. To facilitate the growth, it was growth-facilitating (no surprises there). Make a bigger bet on the future having more energy, that future has more energy: system justified (at least, to those on the right side of the ledger - that doesn't include unpaid children down mines in the Congo digging parts for your phone).
Those who specialised in token allocation/tracking, weren't educated outside that. They keystroked ever-more debt into existence, based on recent history. Given that their view was curtailed, progress was choppy...
We all bought in to the idea that we could all be wealthier - tomorrow. We mostly vote for what we judge the most plausible pronouncer of that promise. We have constructed a whole societal narrative where 'money' outranks any other discussion (note the recent tanker-curtailments have seen the finance minister often interviewed). We also bought in to the 'money is a store of wealth' thing; Kiwisaver, pension funds, investments, returns.
It isn't that they will all be worthless - but if you reduce the energy going into the system - alongside infrastructure aging (eh, Welly?) maintenance requirements coupled with mineral/other resource quality-reduction (it now takes the removal of 400 tons of 'overburden' to get a ton of copper - that was once 10 tons). The problem is the increasing collection of bets, versus the ever-depleted planet. The graphs cross. You can fool yourself that is hasn't happened - until you go to buy something with your 'store of wealth' and find it doesn't go as far as you thought it might have.
That's just inflation, and sucks to you if you lost by it, you might say. The sun will still rise... But sooner or later a system built on growth, either inflates to fit, jubilees/defaults to fit, or gets disbelieved-in. The latter - think 1929 - can happen very suddenly. In Systems terms, that's just a feed-back loop reversing. In global trade terms its collapse. And with food-trading being part of that, population decline wouldn't be far behind.
Which is why some of us urge local food and services...
Yup get what you’re saying around the debt/growth stuff
Still seems like bit of a jump from “things get a bit tighter” to “global trade collapse / population decline”
As mentioned, we’ve had inflation, defaults, crises before and things usually adjust rather than just fall over
So yeh, still not really seeing that end result actually showing up in how things are playing out, beyond the theory
OK, how long from supermarkets empty, to less than 5 million Kiwis alive?
Seriously, ask the dispassionate question?
2 weeks (to quote Trump)? A few more if you're optimistic about social cohesion and law-enforcement...
And imagine the carnage prior...
Yet stop diesel for a couple of months, and that's where we are; the only triage is: everything except food and essential services. Any wonder the pollies are worried?
Well thats a bit of a pivot tbh
Was talking about gradual constraints leading to collapse, and now its jumped to “what if diesel just stops for months”
Sure, in that sort of extreme scenario we’d be having a major crisis, so yeh no argument there
But that aint really the same as saying the system naturally trends toward collapse as things tighten, which was the original point
So as I keep saying, still not really seeing that showing up in how things are actually playing out, where do you think we’re seeing that most clearly?
What do you think we are watching now?
Something somehow not connected to global energy/human overshoot?
Peruse a few episodes of this: I Explored SOUTH CAROLINA Wide Spots In The Road…The Slowly Disappearing Towns - YouTube
and you get why Trump was voted in - twice. Reason? Lower-end America is going backwards (in energy and resource access, to put it bluntly). They vote for someone who doesn't tell the truth; he starts a war over 'what's left'. We get a cessation of tankers. So it cascades. One can never predict the sequence - but one can note the pressure and the end result.
Thinking in Systems: A Primer : Meadows, Donella: Amazon.com.au best book you'll ever read
Ok, so there are pockets of decline and pressure around the place, nothing new there
What I think we’re watching is a system under a bit of pressure ie/ higher costs, tighter resources and things a bit uneven but still mostly adjusting rather than collapsing
So thats still pretty different from a clear system wide trend toward collapse
So far we’ve gone from a general argument about energy constraints, to a diesel shock scenario, to examples of struggling towns in the US
Still aint seeing a clean link between those and a global collapse trajectory actually playing out, beyond stitching a few different things together
Good luck to you.
The links attached to the are useful reading, and that Systems book will take some devouring.
"I’m not really seeing"
Well the clues are there if you look for them. The differences from day to day are small, but incremental. At some point systems reach a tipping point. That's when human arrogance about systems contol becomes obvious to the hairless ape believing they are the centre of the universe. Do you really want to push and push until you're overbalancing at the top of the cliff?
Do energy systems really behave like large rocks teetering on a cliff edge? Do complex and varied energy systems reach tipping points? Is your comment classic doom‑rhetoric: metaphors, moralising, and imagery instead of evidence?
Answers: No, No, Yes
Shoot the messenger thus shooting the message?
Doesn't work, but why the need to?
And the answers are actually: Yes (watch what happens if no tankers turn up for a month or so).
And yes - they even cascade; feed-back-loops feeding feed-back loops. Can't get diesel for the tradies' utes? Sorry, your leak will therefore not be fixed and will proceed to ruin all your MDF. Worse, they cannot get to the grid pylon... so you'll only see that MDF damage during the hours of daylight...
So no to the last one - but your need is fierce, eh? I'm guessing you have forward bets already laid, which are dependent on future growth? Indeed perhaps you are looking at ruin if it ceases? (Nothing personal - that describes perhaps the majority in the First World). Can be a powerful driver of denial-via-denigration, can that.
Are you claiming Palmtree08's comment is not "classic doom‑rhetoric: metaphors, moralising, and imagery instead of evidence?"
I'm not shooting the messenger here at all, rather the message. The whole gist of this debate has been about the need for clear and concise language. Anyway, you appear to attack the messenger (me) in your last paragraph. .
(edit: the gist is really the importance of applying proper science and logic)
Seems some do not understand the concept of logic, preferring instead to repeat ad infinitum their own biases. The proper application of science and logic would mean accepting the current frenzied burn of geologically stored energy is re engineering our planet into something less favourable for continued human existence and a coincidental extinction event. Science that cleverly advances tech for further extraction does nothing to advance logic! The planet is finite. It's resources are finite. It's waste sinks are finite!
"Clear and concise" seems to mean support for tinkering with the planets life support systems with gadgetry that Wall st can financialise, when the current planetary biological system has scientifically proved itself as a reliable source of long term sustenance for life on Earth.
Ah well, there's the crux of your ignorance. "Energy systems", by which I imagine you are inferring synthetic, human developed, extraction, dissapation systems, aren't some sort of magical god like concept, independent of the natural systems they function within.
The evidence that the Earth is round and finite is kind of incontrovertable. No amount of blah blah tech, blah blah nuclear, blah blah ingenuity blah, is going to change that fact! The imagery of how humans are wrecking the planet chasing exponentially growing wealth and ease is everywhere for those with functioning eyesight. Consuming energy, excreting waste, without any sort of understanding or wisdom, is what yeast does!
What you are describing here is really just your posture regarding these matters. It contains no argument.
We all know that the Earth is round and finite but we are discussing systems engineering contained within that world.
PDK can't even get his Canute analogy right and thinks PV and wind are "no brainers".
"Pump storage systems, needed for solar and wind energy, have been included in the EROI so that the efficiency can be compared with an “unbuffered” scenario. The results show that nuclear, hydro, coal, and natural gas power systems (in this order) are one order of magnitude more effective than photovoltaics and wind power.
... Photovoltaics, biomass and wind (buffered) are below the economical threshold.
...EROI of run-of-river hydro power plant, New Zealand, based on numbers from Ref.
[7]. The energy payback times are in the range from 2 years (unbuffered) to 3 years
(buffered).
Installed capacity 90 MW
Lifetime 100 a
Location Waitaki River, New Zealand
Full-load hours 3000 (predictable)
Energy demand construction 1800 TJ
Energy demand maintenance 75 TJ (100 TJ for an assumed turbine
replacement not included here)
Decommissioning 60 TJ
EROI 50
EROI, buffered 35
EROIs and key figures [45] of the reference nuclear power plant (100% centrifuge
enrichment in brackets). The energy payback time is about 2 months.
Installed capacity (net) 1340 MW
Full-load hours 8000
Lifetime 60 a
Output 2,315,000 TJ
Construction energy demand 4050 TJ, thereof 35% electrical
Decommissioning
energy demand
1150 TJ, thereof 40% electrical
Maintenance energy demand 6900 TJ, thereof 68% electrical
Fuel related energy demand 18,800 TJ (9650 TJ), thereof 68% (40%) electrical
Sum energy demand 30,900 TJ (21,750 TJ), thereof 60% (50%)
electrical
EROI 75 (105)
Solar photovoltaics production line’s energy demand [23].
Manufacturing step Embodied
energy [MJ]
Thereof
electrical [%]
Production metallurgical grade silicon 72 100
Purifying (Siemens process) 850 65
Wafer production 190 70
Cell production 180 75
Module production (frame) 480 80
Sub-total 1772 67
The embodied energy of the production plant and for the module installation
is taken from Ref. [22]. For an open-field plant, a frame made of steel is
used, which is not necessary for a roof installation.
PV module production plant 150 70
Installation roof/field 180/250 40
Total roof/field 2102/2172 67/64
EROIs for solar photovoltaics with 1000 peak hours per year (Germany) using the
energy inputs from Table 2. The energy payback times are in the range from 6 years
(unbuffered) to 16 years (buffered).
Poly-Si roof/field Amorphous roof/field
Embodied energy [MJ] 2102/2172 880/950
Lifetime energy production [MJ] 8353 2000
EROI 4.0/3.8 2.3/2.1
EROI, buffered 2.3/2.3 1.6/1.5"
Energy intensities, EROIs (energy returned on invested), and energy payback times of electricity generating power plants
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0360544213000492
There is a useful lesson both in that comment, and the paper referred-to.
Can I ask folk to read it, then read my piece, again?
Let's see who can identify the discrepancy?
Comparing a battery with a generator....and the stated EROEIs look to be unique.
If you don't like referenced peer reviewed research you could try real world examples like Germany/California vs. France or read McKay's withouthotair.com.
Solar panels and wind mills are always going to suck as they produce no process heat, have low capacity factors, don't provide inertia for the gird, require backup and use vast areas of land and resultant high transmission cost.
"Germany’s renewables costs—for solar panels and wind turbines and biogas plants—were rapidly forced onto consumers.
A study by the OECD found that the cost of household electricity in Germany increased by 50 percent from 2006–2017. And the report came to a surprising conclusion:
- Electricity prices will continue to increase as long as Germany keeps building solar and wind.
Meanwhile, France’s electricity costs are 40 percent lower than Germany’s."
https://carboncredits.com/nuclear-education-how-germany-lost-another-wo…
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/09/11/had-they-b…
"Ok, so now back up all of YOUR claims with some actual data or references. Or better yet, write an opinion piece supporting your position and get it published on here."
This is a classic logical flaw, trying to shift the 'burden of proof'. Otherwise known as a big red flag that the argument is merely a narrative.
I’m not making collapse claims, PDK is. I'm making observations about who doesn’t share this narrative. It's easy to verify that:
Economists don't publish collapse‑EROEI models in mainstream journals.
Energy‑systems scientists are not forecasting imminent global energy collapse.
Governments are not planning for radical energy contraction.
Oil companies are not warning us about terminal decline.
None of that is making a speculative claim.
PDK's article does have issues. Category errors, unsupported assumptions, metaphors in place of data, misuse of EROEI, and ignoring system dynamics.
Don't take this as personal criticism. I'm trying to help out here. If this narrative is to be taken seriously the analytical flaws need to be addressed.
"PDK's article does have issues. Category errors, unsupported assumptions, metaphors in place of data, misuse of EROEI, and ignoring system dynamics."
Care to identify the category errors, the misuse of EROEI....and how has system dynamics been ignored?
Category errors:
Treating fundamental laws of physics as if they determine economic outcomes or system level outcomes. These are different categories.
Misuse of EROEI:
EROEI is an engineering metric that applies to specific projects. It doesn't predict the success or failure of a civilization. PDK uses it as if it determines global supply, economic growth, and system viability. If EROEI behaved the way he claims, global production would already be falling. It isn’t.
Ignoring system dynamics:
PDK’s model takes no account of energy substitution, portfolio effects, demand change, market signals, and technological evolution. Thinks of the future as a straight‑line extrapolation of the past.
The category error is yours if you think that either economics or systems operate outside the laws of physics.
EROI is not exclusively an engineering metric at all. Google Charles Hall.
The systems model that analyses the impact of EROI is not PDKs and it certainly does not ignore substitution, economic behaviour nor technology, rather it directly addresses those factors and makes the case why they will not ( and did not) override the basics of available energy....as you would have noticed if you read/watch some of the previously provided links.
These are things that are indeed being discussed by scientists and engineers in public and hopefully one day soon politicians and (mainstream) economists will notice.
as you would have noticed if you read/watch some of the previously provided links. Classic from the chap who didn't bother to read peer reviewed research linked above. Always illuminating how peer review is ignored, and Youtube is preferred, when it comes to peak oil tragics.
"A book by Hall, Cleveland and Kaufmann from 1986 [20] presents
one of the first most extensive collections. However, the
mathematical procedure was not quite consistent, as the weighting
was applied for the input for all power plants while the output
energy was weighted only for fossil fuels and “renewable” energies
but not for nuclear energy. For nuclear energy, the power plant was
included in the energy demand but for fossil fuels not, just mining
costs and shipment. Additionally, the nuclear enrichment process
was based on the barely used but extremely energy-intense diffusion
process. Furthermore, all EMROIs there are merely costbased
top-down calculations which include all the human labor
costs. This moves the results further away from R and Rem towards
a pure cost ratio excluding the power plant and there is no relation
to the EROI anymore.
A widespread collection of numbers called “EROI” can be found
in blog entries assigned to Hall on the website “The Oil Drum”,
managed by the “Institute for the Study of Energy and Our Future”,
cumulated in a so-called “balloon graph” [46] which shows the
“EROI” (actually more the EMROI) versus the (U.S. domestic)
primary energy contribution. They refer to Hall’s book for fossil
fuels and therefore suffer from the same flaws. For fossil fuels the
process chain ends when the fuel is delivered to the power plant,
completely disregarding the power plant itself and therefore
reducing the energy demand remarkably. Again, the energy output
for fossil fuels as well as for “renewables” has been weighted by 2e
3, but for nuclear energy no weighting was applied, strongly disadvantaging
the latter.
To give an example, Hall’s result for the EMROI for coal is pretty
large, around 65, contrary to the results here for coal (Sec. 7.6) of only
49. However, when only the mining is included, the EMROI climbs to
61 in fair agreement with Halls result, though it does not describe
neither the EROI, nor the EMROI anymore (see Sec. 7.6). For natural
gas, there are no reproducible data at all, just a statement that the
EROI should be 10:1.
...The most common flaws are
Tweaking the lifetime. Absurd low lifetimes are assumed for
fossil and nuclear plants, and unrealistic high ones for
“regenerative” plants.
“Upgrading” the output. The output energy is multiplied by 3 for
reasons of “primary energy equivalent”, i.e. the EMROI is calculated,
but compared with the EROI of conventional plants.
Counting all output, even if not needed, i.e. ignoring the need for
buffering."
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0360544213000492
Highlights
- •
Serious methodological errors in a paper by Weißbach et al. invalidate their results.
- •
The origin of such errors is investigated and explained.
- •
Weißbach et al.'s findings and conclusions are rebutted.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0360544214014327…
Is there anything more boring than Raugei quibbling over EROI definitions (see also Ferroni Hopkirk vs Raugei) who found solar panels were net negative in Switzerland). Your man Hall agrees with Weißbach that hydro and nuclear are superior to solar panels by an order of mangitude) and Raugei does not refute this.
"…But in 2013 Prieto and Hall came out with a much lower estimate of EROI of 2.45:1 for sunny Spain with sophisticated engineers, which caused a great stir amongst solar advocates. This was initially greeted with disbelief by many in the industry. But then similar results were published by Palmer (2013) for rooftop PVs with battery back up in Australia, and Weissbach et al. (2013), for Germany (see also Raugei 2013; Weissbach et al. 2014; Raugei et al. 2015)."
https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-319-47821-0
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421517302914
Nobody is claiming economics or systems “operate outside physics.”
That’s a strawman.
The Second Law is a design constraint. It doesn't predict outcomes.
Everything we build already operates inside an entropy governed universe. Engineered systems function because we design within those constraints.
What we’re actually discussing here are models of system behaviour, not the existence of entropy.
Invoking the Second Law as if it directly forecasts economic or civilizational outcomes is exactly the category error I’m pointing out.
AI would appear to disagree with you....
"The second law of thermodynamics plays a foundational, unavoidable role in civilisational collapse by dictating that all ordered systems (societies, cities, infrastructure) require a continuous, increasing input of energy to maintain their structure, while inevitably dissipating waste and disorder (entropy) into their surroundings.
Sustainability Shiksha +1
Civilizations act as dissipative structures—low-entropy anomalies that maintain complexity by importing high-quality energy and exporting high-entropy waste. Collapse, therefore, is not merely a political or social failure, but a thermodynamic inevitability when the energy cost to maintain complexity exceeds the energy available."
Appeal to authority and not even an authority at that.
It just produced a popular internet narrative. LLMs generate plausible text, not physics.
If you ask AI, “Explain why collapse is inevitable,” it will produce collapse‑themed thermodynamics.
If you ask “Explain why collapse is not thermodynamically inevitable,” it will produce the opposite.
The line, "Sustainability Shiksha +1" is a bit odd isn't it. Sounds like it scraped something from a Hindi sustainability‑themed YouTube channel, blog, or social‑media account.
Actually here it is:
https://sustainability.shiksha/sustainability-science/
This is the "authority" you are appealing to. Not a physics or engineering authority.
The problem is that the entropy law only operates in one direction, so your (reverse) posit is impossible.
:)
Look in the mirror - you can tell within a very narrow band of probability, how old you are. That's entropy at work, and the end result is the same in every case. It never reverses.
Although many have tried,,,
Ageing is a biological process governed by genetics and cellular damage. It is not a model for global energy systems.
I found one of the great delights in a long life, was learning how to think un-convolutedly.
Try not eating, see what it does to your cell-structure. Try not putting fuel in your car's tank, or oil in its sump.
I guarantee both of you run to a halt. Quite a similar outcome.
At this stage, I'd put my money on the car being the first to understand why.
Lol...as it happens the search was "the role of the 2nd law of thermodynamics in civilisational collapse" ....a neutral framing I'd suggest.
But fair enough, AI has its limitations....currently.
However the system we have built does indeed depend upon the maintenance of the energy systems which support it and if that energy declines then the system itself will cease to function until a new system emerges that can be supported by the new level of energy....that is unlikely to be a gradual decline in such an interdependent system. You may wish to reserve EROEI for specific projects and it may be fair to observe that its application to a wider field comes with problems of specification/methodology but it is also evident that the energy cost of energy is increasing with all that induces even if difficult to measure....more energy devoted to converting energy is less energy for all other.
"Treating history as destiny."
Was that meant to be tongue in cheek? Or just oblivious?
Not "tongue in cheek" at all. It’s pointing out a weak point in PDK's argument. A historical trend of one aspect like EROEI doesn't determine what will happen in a system that has multiple sources and technologies.
It's like a cracked record.
Firstly don't conflate sources with technologies, eh? Makes it easier. Technologies can only make processes more efficient - and the 2nd Law/Carnot tell us there are absolute limits to efficiencies.
Secondly, if the highest EROEI source in a System is from finite stocks - and makes up 80% of the energy used globally - then the total EROEI is going to reduce.
And no system based on the dissipation of a low-entropy resource, is permanent.
Turned on it's head, that statement tells us the SUSTAINABLE rate of energy-use (by our species long-term on this planet, and the EROEI of getting off it limits us to this planet) is orders of magnitude less than our current frenzy. Some of us suggest that we need to be thinking about that.
Yeh get the efficiency / EROEI point
But thats just a constraint, not an outcome
We’ve had declining resource quality and rising costs before, and the system adapts rather than just falling over
Still not seeing the step between “limits exist” and “therefore collapse”, at least in how
I take issue with the claim that physical laws like entropy and Carnot limits determine global supply, economics, energy substitution, technological evolution and the general trajectory of the system. Physics sets boundaries but not how the system behaves.
EROEI is a metric used for individual engineering projects. It doesn't apply at a civilization-wide level. If it did we would be seeing production falling yet we see it rising.
You can say finite things are finite but that doesn't tell us anything we didn't already know, does it? We are looking at things like storage, the role of electrification, energy substitution, nuclear power, technological efficiencies and changing demand.
Claiming sustainable rates of energy use is orders of magnitude less than our current use is just an assertion not backed up with any evidence. Just a gut feeling.
You're treating the entire global energy system as if it were that single tank of water on a hill. Things are much more complex and dynamic than that.
You're treating the entire global energy system as if it were that single tank of water on a hill.
In many ways it is, when considering crude oil and gas trapped in pockets under the ground that took tens or hundreds of millions of years to form. You can argue it isn't finite, but then the contrast to this argument is the time scale. It's note likely humans will be around another hundred million years, nor be willing to accept living standards from 250years ago for that 100mil to extract more of the same energy as it forms.
The great fallacy i see in your view, respectfully of course, is that it seems to be limited by your lifespan. If one does not anticipate major changes effecting them in their lifetime then they may be inclined not to care or deny any possible evidence that possibly their children or grandchildren may have struggles they have not, or see society going in any other direction than the monumentous leaps and bounds in technology and living standards seen since the harnessing of coal and crude oil.
"Readers should no doubt have noticed that this sort of narrative is almost entirely absent from the people who actually work with energy systems."
I'm curious who these people are that actually work with energy systems?
"Economists and scientists don’t support it. Governments don’t plan around it"
Personally, I don't hold economists with very high regard. Any regard really. As a profession it's sort of a cross between tunnel vision ideology, witchcraft and navel gazing.
Governments don't plan around it?
Well no they don't, because they aren't capable people, suffer information deficit, combined with inflated ego.
Adaptation to less available energy will occur....though it is highly unlikely it will occur by design.
Oil is relatively new. For instance the first oil fired vessel of the Royal Navy, HMS Spiteful was not commissioned until 1904. Oil though has, I would suggest, proved to be the most transformative substance ever introduced to human life. For instance not long after, post WW1 the redoubtable Lord Curzon remarked that the Allies had sailed to victory on a sea of oil. From there it has literally ventured into every form of our life, be it energy, clothing, pharmaceuticals, fertiliser and products galore. It is indeed the oil age following the three recognised earlier ones. At the moment though, asking about how long it will last is akin to asking the same question about our sun. In other words it is just taken for granted.
I wouldn't say that oil is taken for granted by those involved with the energy system. Maybe by laymen that don't think about things awfully much. They wisely leave it to the experts. The factors surrounding oil extraction are reasonably well understood and the expectation is that fossil fuels will continue to serve us well as we transition to other energy sources and improve technology. Fossil fuels remain an important and valid part of the evolving energy system.
Yes your second sentence is what I was getting at. As always, I need to learn to express more specifics and less generalisations.
'that don't think about things awfully much. They wisely leave it to...'
Eloquent...
Edit - I've just realised, that'll be the eloquent in the room...
I'm trying to be relatable. Let's face it, it's laymen you are targeting here.
No, you're expending a good deal of energy to refute.
Why the need?
I'm guessing personal narrative is both important, and threatened?
Good luck with that.
Well, there has been a lot of minor skirmishing in the comments lately concerning this topic. And now a whole article! I've noticed a few commenters seeming to be captured by your arguments. On the surface they can be compelling. Counter de-growthers could be becoming a minority around here and I feel this needs to be addressed. Readers could benefit from sound objections.
Full scale war has now broken out Our negotiators patiently await a peace proposal.
You never know, these discussions may help you to hone your arguments somewhat.
Well in regard to the said layman, if you take a gander at flight radar at any one time or of traffic on the New Jersey Pike you will view millions of gallons of gas being gobbled up by the hour by users from the hoi polloi to the rich and famous. Whether or not that is in ignorance, defiance or just plain selfishness; it is undeniable that the vast percentage of humanity will not change its mind about maximising the use of oil and its derivatives for their own needs, be it profit making, pleasure or necessity until they are forced to and that might need to be a meteor occasion as what put paid to the dinosaurs. My apologies for an unfortunate point of view about an unfortunate reality.
Don't look Up was an important movie
and it wasn't about a meteor...
Like that time France built 56 reactors in 15 years and is now the world's largest electricity exporter?
I have thought of a good, easy to understand, comparison of category errors that are tripping people up.
The fact that fossil fuels are finite is a big "gotcha" for many people. How can one argue against that? PDK has often used the example of human aging to reinforce the notion that decline and collapse is inevitable. We see it in our own bodies but do we see it in what could be described as the human system, families? Aging and family are similar category errors to the 2nd Law and energy collapse arguments.
Aging is real and irreversible but we don’t use the aging of one person to predict the fate of an entire family. The individual and the family are in different categories. A family is a system. It can add new members, adapt, reorganise, and change direction even though individuals age. It even evolves given enough time.
The Second Law is the same kind of thing. Entropy is real and irreversible but you can’t use it to predict the trajectory of a whole energy system. Fundamental physical laws and global energy systems are different categories. Energy systems are complex, adaptive networks that add new sources, substitute fuels, improve efficiency, electrify, innovate, and reorganise. They evolve too.
Treating the 2nd Law as if it directly forecasts energy depletion or civilizational collapse is the same category error as treating one person’s aging as a predictor of whether their entire family will collapse.
Postscript: I'm aware that I may be coming across as too hostile. I've learned a lot and clarified things in my own mind during this discussion. Energy use and depletion of energy sources is an important subject and we need people to keep an eye on things and point out the dangers and concerns.
Murray Grimwood's advice is worth pondering. It's just that making the 2nd Law foundational to the argument presents a significant weakness.
I have learnt a lot too from the exchanges. No you have not been hostile and nor have the other contributors gone beyond accepted styles of discourse. The site is by nature robust but the established participants, on the whole are civil and that is one of its great strengths. Everyone is entitled to offer a view and if it is sincere, of some basis and well intended, entitled too, to have it considered.
The 2nd Law applies irrevocably, in all cases, all the time.
Let's pencil that in - there is no perpetual motion.
When humans evolved, a small proportion of solar energy had, millions of years ago and over millions of years - been turned into life-forms (carbon based, like us) which decayed (succumbed to entropy, in the physical sense of the word). The residual bonded carbon was compressed geologically - you can trace the energy input to that, if you wish; it's there and accountable; the 2nd Law says so.
Also present when humans irrupted, was a global stock of sunlight-derived carbon, in trees (and other plant matter). That stock,we raided first, and we're still drawing it down; 2 felled for one planted, globally (and the felled ones are mature, the planted one is a seedling). Whole civilisations rose and fell, as the tapped into, then overused, such local stocks. The Fertile Crescent is now desert.
Then we tapped into the underground store - a one-off event. Rather than using such a precious one-off stock, we partied like there will be no tomorrow. We assumed that tankful, was forever full. Challenged, we chose to believe in seamless replacements, while inviting more and more to the party and drinking faster ourselves.
The problem comes with stocks, and flows. Most folk see the latter but presume the former. Beyond that one-off draw-down (those drawdowns, if you count trees as well) we have to live within the constraints of the real-time solar energy we can capture - while not heating or cooling our planet (that dratted 2nd Law again - climate change at this scale was inevitable) and while allowing enough spare to do the weather and other-biosphere things without which we don't exist (our species is other-species dependent).
The outliers are geothermal and nuclear, but we have yet to demonstrate that we can build or maintain either, ex fossil energy. And - rather than building-out alternatives, we have just seen how dependent we still are on fossil carbon; 80% globally and 50% of our food (we are eating our way through fossil carbon via Haber Bosch - a temporary arrangement). Both those only do electricity and local heat - neither are a feedstock for plastics, road-surfaces etc. And electricity storage runs into physics/chemistry limits - it'll never do long-haul flight or shipping.
And we need to be resilient as a country, ex inputs - because that is what is happening, and the pressure will only get worse (supply-line-wise). That requires a different collection of skills that we currently have, and a different way of accounting. Because physical abundance, if based on a drawing-down, is temporary and maintenance-abeyance end up in abandonment at some triage-point.
Well that mostly looks like restating the same argument with a bit more detail
Agree on the constraints side of it tho
Still aint seeing that translating into a clear collapse dynamic in how the system is actually behaving though
So that gap is still there...
Do you quit smoking because the health people say it is dangerous - or wait till a nodule shows up on your lungs?
Draw-down of finite anything, can only end.
Exponential increase of drawdown of finite anything - can only end quicker.
Staying on the Titanic might have seemed a cosier option - but the physics won. The correct choice was to create a floating alternative ahead of the sinking.
:)
The decline of any single energy source doesn’t produce a sudden stop, like falling off a cliff, to our ability to build new energy infrastructure. Some sources will decline while others will expand. The decline isn’t uniform, and the system doesn’t behave like a single tank running dry. Energy systems will transition with the mix of fossil, renewable, and nuclear inputs changing over time. That’s already happening.
Industrial processes that once depended heavily on fossil fuels are electrifying. Steelmaking is shifting to electric arc furnaces. Cement production can use electricity and hydrogen. Mining equipment is increasingly electric. The proportion of renewable energy used in construction and heavy industry is rising every year.
Institutions that actually model and operate energy systems, grid operators, the International Energy Agency, the U.S. Energy Information Administration, academic energy‑systems modellers, and the oil industry’s own forecasting do not use the 2nd Law as a predictive tool for collapse. It’s not because they’ve forgotten physics; it’s because the 2nd Law isn’t relevant at the system‑modelling level. Telling them “finite things are finite” would get a simple “yes, we know” in response.
We have many decades, realistically the rest of the century, to utilize fossil and renewable energy together to support the construction of new energy infrastructure, including nuclear. The concerning limiting factors today are policy, investment, and institutional capacity, not fundamental physical laws. We have a runway in front of us rather than a cliff's edge. The tools we use to understand it come from geology, engineering, economics, and observed system behaviour.
So much so wrong, it isn't worth discussing with you anymore.
Good luck with it all
Zachs point was more about how the system is actually behaving in practice, which is what I’ve been getting at as well
Still, that hasn’t been addressed, just more around why it should happen rather than how it actually is, which is kinda the bit I was asking about
No, it wasn't.
His has always been a fierce need for what is so, to be not so.
You could see him going along - and along - then Zing back to default, like an old Imperial typewriter heading back for another line.
I'm not sure you aren't in the same league, but until proven etc etc.
Try something. Fill a tapered-neck bottle under a tap. Try and turn the tap off when it is full, but so as not to spill any, The rate of per-second-per-second beats you every time. We all know it's coming; the rate of change beats us. So too with linear thinkers (which is most folk - put yourself through this: Programmed to Ignore? | Do the Math ) failing to allow for rapid change in Systems - his 'next century; no need to worry for now' being a classic (although it will be denial driven - there will be a powerful personal driver behind the avoidance, and an interesting/complex mind, in that most just run away and close the door. I'm guessing the psychology of that is that he knows, deep down.
Some of us went through this discussion 20 years ago. Back then we challenged the IEA (Chris Laidlaw was a once-upon-a-time employee) about Peak Oil, and Birol acknowledged. That would have been about 2007. ince then, they have advocated 'renewables' but under the happy banner of climate-addressing. Never mentioning depletion...
This was towards the end of that era (we'd had the discussion); The Oil Drum | Stumbling Blocks to Figuring Out the Real Oil Limits Story
Fatih Birol Presents the IEA World Energy Outlook 2007 - Docsbay (we were on the money, way back then)
The era that came next was The Great Simplification with Nate Hagens
My first "IT" job was fixing Imperial typewriters.
I’ve been trying to understand what this looks like in the real world energy and economic system
What are we actually seeing right now that reflects that? ie/ where is this showing up in practice, rather than just why it should happen?
Debt overhang, and inflation (if you're looking at showing up in $$$).
Local Authority rates (essentially materials and energy demand) outpacing incomes - and the gap is exponentially widening.
Student loans - weren't needed at all in 40 years ago. The system isn't paying its way.
Health (demographics aside) is equally broke(n).
All the Ponzi virtual extensions; Real Estate pumping (houses are subject to entropy, so should be depreciated to fit decay), everything else pumping (from GTHO Falcons to art to whatever) - all hoping to have more proxy, all expecting to be cash-in-able on some processed parts of a being-depleted planet. Call that an everything-bubble.
The signs are there (Cohen).
Yeh righto then but that all just looks like general economic pressure to me
Still not really seeing how that ties back to an energy driven collapse in the system itself
From my reading so far and general enquiries on the Internet all indications are that we will meet all our energy needs over the next hundred years when we will be truly entering the electricity age. The main concerns are institutional ones and allocating sufficient investment input.
We still have vast reserves of practically everything. Oil and gas can supplement the energy to build more nuclear, solar, thermal, wind power. Coal is also a plentiful store of energy that we will likely never need. Raw materials like iron, aluminum, copper, nickel, cobalt, lead etc are not in danger. Recycling will continue to improve. The trajectory of energy transition is tracking well.
Yup thats kinda how I’m seeing it as well, system under pressure but still adapting rather than anything breaking down
"..not sure you aren't in the same league"
"oil industry’s own forecasting do not use the 2nd Law as a predictive tool for collapse. It’s not because they’ve forgotten physics; it’s because the 2nd Law isn’t relevant at the system‑modelling level. Telling them “finite things are finite” would get a simple “yes, we know” in response."
That's really funny. Reminds me of that fine organisation Exxon Mobil. When oil company scientists were asked if the companies product was damaging climate, they answered "yes, we're cooking the planet". Soon after the company buried the science and began funding the global astroturfing campaign. Still are. Companies foreast for profit, nothing more! To use this as an example of some sort of superior form of systems analysis is naive at best!
It could be worthwhile exploring the plethora of information available at the International Energy Agency (IEA) website:
I'm going to have a dig around to see if I can find any anomalies. There's a lot of research going on in the field of energy systems as you would expect. Looking to see if I can find any collapse information. I suspect PDK's views are the very worst of worst case scenarios. This all boils down to where one is on the scale - from high pessimism to high optimism, and opinions are unlikely to change anytime soon.
Suppose is depends how much Trump slime has been poured over it?
https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/sustainable-switch-climate-focus…
Good place to start?
https://iea.blob.core.windows.net/assets/9ea2076e-5a0d-4a0d-9767-a1eec2…
"Introduction: Some elements of the global energy system are evolving rapidly. Nonetheless, oil and natural gas resources will continue to be needed for many decades to come."
Looks like, from my speed read, that all that is needed is plenty of investment to sustain extraction levels required for the runway.
Science says we'll have an existential ecological crisis if we continue the burn, or increase it. The "needed for decades to come" is scientifically illiterate bollocks and shows just how siloed self interested ideological thinking will have us over the cliff. We are only now experiencing the effects of emissions from the turn of the century. The return to temperature equilibrium as feed back effects play out, will take 000s of years. A digital dollar now is worth more than a viable future biosphere though right?
A good question to ask yourself at this juncture is why? What is this primary directive we've been conditioned into believing is the "only way"? The "only way" that is worth sacrificing the natural world for? Extract, consume, excrete, rinse and repeat. Glaciers gone, mountains bare, species extinct, sky brown from injected sulphates, sea empty, all sacrificed for this grand exponential growth plan. Perhaps your moniker is a clue? You believe we'll become some sort of space faring civilisation floating around in space cans?
From IEA
"If all capital investment in existing sources of oil and gas production were to cease immediately, global oil production would fall by 8% per year on average over the next decade, or around 5.5 million barrels per day (mb/d) each year."
OK, all investment isn't going to stop. This is the worst case scenario, barring a global economic meltdown for some reason. It seems pretty apparent humanity is causing some severe disruption to the BAU scenario, with much production likely having to be shut in over the following months, causing well damage and potentially affecting future production. This is going to cause some investment to stop. Is the current geopolitic the new normal? There's a good chance it is!
Who'd have known?
Fancy that.
:)
Edit: Those graphs don't bode too well, given entropy and all. What is interesting is that the clutcher-at-straws identified a self-justifying straw. Anyone reading the whole paper, would realise is spells the end for growth, and that the implications are that a growth-requiring token-system, is in permanent trouble, starting now. Well, actually starting a few decades ago, given the lead-time of some bets.
Yeah, it's a damn good report actually. Running hard to stand still seems to be the overall theme.
I've found two things interesting over the weekend; one is that someone can opine so vehemently, hard and long - without ever having thought to do their homework first.
It beggars belief; I was trundling through depletion-rates and learning about EROEI, 20 years ago. Was part of that conversation in the old Oil Drum days.
The other thing is the ability to linearise and cherry-pick (it seems to be intertwined: I want to find something that supports this, so I'll ignore all of that except....
It's going to be a major failing, addressing a fast-changing world. Going to be? Is. Because such illogical thinking results in ever-more fossil-dependent stuff - Ford Rangers, roads - being built with the remainder. But which means the last of it was squandered on guaranteed stranded assets.
Mind-bogglingly myopic.
NEW YORK, April 15 (Reuters) - U.S. oil production will peak at 14 million barrels per day in 2027 and maintain that level through the end of the decade, before rapidly declining, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said on Tuesday.
Oil output from the world's largest producer will fall to about 11.3 million bpd in 2050, from around 13.7 million bpd this year, the statistical arm of the U.S. Department of Energy said in its Annual Energy Outlook.
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/us-crude-oil-output-peak-by-202…
Keep in mind - "global" energy sources.
Keep in mind that the US is the worlds largest producer of oil ...and the largest consumer.
You could have shortened that to
Keep in mind
:)
Modern life is way too much fun to worry about any of this bollocks. There ain’t a goddamn thing any of us can do about it anyway so onwards and upwards.
At the outset of this column the editor posted a comment, in form something of a rider, which was subsequently deleted. From what I recall it was a reminder that viewpoints do not, and cannot here, assume ownership of any one topic to the point of claiming infallibility.
Nobody should ever stop thinking - it's an insult to oneself.
But there are a lot who do.
I thought we had a clear and consistent winner for the 'I'll stop thinking here' award, but two up is a comment which might have pipped the favourite at the post.
I'm betting the writer stopped 'upwarding' in his mid 20s. A biological imperative traceable to the 2nd Law, as they all are.
I couldn’t give a rats arse what you think of me. You and I are nothing more than 2 temporary life forms hurling through space. Your crusade is a waste of time.
Interesting that the rider (or was it a disclaimer?) was removed. I was only just thinking about this in regard to the article. The article is posted under the category of 'opinion' which is something of a disclaimer because it certainly wouldn't be rigorous enough to be classed as 'science'.
Oddly enough, it might just be that if the editor should choose to reprint that particular post, here towards the end of all of the preceding commentary, it would have both more pertinence and conveyance. Just supposing.
Murray Grimwood's ideas are worth "thinking" about. It is, perhaps, the spirit of the message that we should absorb. And I'm sure the message is delivered with the best of intentions; seeking to protect finite resources for future generations of humans. Living a sustainable life now, he practices what he preaches and seeks to enlighten others.
I wondered, what would ChatGPT make of this article? Of course A.I has it's limitations but it is a useful tool.
I asked ChatGPT: "Can you analyze this article for logical errors and technical errors?"
I copy and paste the article.
The result I got was brutal. I invite anyone so inclined to try it themselves and make of it what they will.
Try various AI tools even.
I'll only mention two errors, of the many it found, as they are dear to my heart.
X - Misuse of the Second Law
X - “Exponential” is used rhetorically, not mathematically.
When I saw those two errors, listed among the many, I almost dropped to my knees, hands clasped as if in prayer, . Oh Spacecadet where art thou?
You are unnecessarily over exited about your "gottya" moment. ChatGBT has zero capacity for independent thought. It merely regurgitates the heaviest weight of tomes it has been fed. The notion that exponential economic growthism is ultimately a self terminating ideology is buried under a mountain of self congratulatary backslapping nonsense churned out every second of the day, to be repeated ad infinitum by an equally intellectually dull media. All ChatGBT has done is churn out the weighted average of what it's been fed!
The industry driven proposal that AI is a replacement for independent human thought is a truly scary prospect.
The computer went nuts!
Anyway, it was good to see AI validating my concerns over the rhetorical use of the word "exponential".
Is the EROEI of crude oil production decreasing and if so, by how much?
AI
Yes, the Energy Return on Energy Investment (EROEI, or EROI) of crude oil production is decreasing, reflecting a long-term trend where more energy is required to extract, process, and deliver petroleum products.
Energy Efficiency & Conservation Authority | EECA +1
Trends and Extent of Decline:
- Global Trend: Global EROI for oil and gas has shown a downward trend, falling from a peak of roughly 35:1 in 1999 to around 18:1 by 2006, and continuing to decline in the following decades.
- US Decline: The EROI for U.S. oil and gas discovery and production decreased exponentially from roughly 1200:1 in 1919 to 5:1 in 2007, with production EROI dropping from ~20:1 (1919–1972) to roughly 11:1 in the late 2000s.
- Specific Examples: The Daqing oil field in China fell from 10:1 (2001) to 6.5:1 (2009). Canadian tar sands, which are increasingly important to supply, show much lower EROI values, generally in the 3:1 to 5:1 range.
- Overall Rate: Global EROI decreased at an annual rate of 1.6% over the period 1995 to 2020
Will the pursuit of economic growth damage earths life support systems?
AI response,
"Yes, the pursuit of traditional, unchecked economic growth—defined by increasing production, consumption, and GDP—is widely considered by scientists and researchers to be a primary driver of damage to Earth's life support systems. This relentless expansion has historically led to the overexploitation of natural resources, widespread environmental degradation, and the crossing of several "planetary boundaries" critical for human survival."
What AI did you use? I got quite a coherent result with ChatGPT using your prompt. I suspect you cherry picked that result and your answer was much more detailed and balanced.
The thing about the output is you can cross check and confirm the result.
With the results from examination of the article, at the very least, it highlights that we are looking at something that is very far from being mainstream.
Standard Google AI. Nothing was cherry picked!
And that's all it gave you?
With ChatGPT I get this with your prompt:
Short answer: it can—but it doesn’t have to. Whether economic growth damages Earth’s life-support systems depends on how that growth happens.
What “life-support systems” means
We’re talking about planetary processes that keep conditions stable for life, often described as Earth system functions, including:
- climate regulation
- biodiversity and ecosystems
- freshwater cycles
- soil and nutrient systems
These are sometimes framed through the Planetary boundaries concept—thresholds we shouldn’t cross.
Why growth has caused damage so far
Historically, economic growth has been tightly linked to:
- higher energy use (mostly fossil fuels)
- land conversion (forests → agriculture, cities)
- resource extraction
This coupling has driven problems like:
- climate change
- biodiversity loss
- pollution
So empirically, yes: past growth has significantly degraded life-support systems.
The key issue: coupling vs decoupling
The real question is whether growth can be decoupled from environmental harm.
1) Relative decoupling (common)
- Economy grows faster than environmental impact
- But total damage still increases
2) Absolute decoupling (harder, but crucial)
- Economy grows while total impact declines
Some countries have achieved partial absolute decoupling in:
- carbon emissions (for periods)
- air pollution
But globally, full decoupling across all impacts hasn’t been achieved yet.
Where the concern is valid
There are real risks if growth continues in its current form:
⚠️ Scale problem
Even efficient systems can overwhelm nature if total activity keeps expanding.
⚠️ Rebound effects
Efficiency gains can lead to more consumption (related to Jevons Paradox).
⚠️ Irreversible damage
Some systems (like biodiversity loss) don’t easily recover once degraded.
Where the “inevitable collapse” argument goes too far
Claims that growth must destroy the planet often assume:
- technology won’t improve
- energy systems can’t change
- societies won’t adapt
Those assumptions are not guaranteed.
Examples of real shifts already happening:
- rapid expansion of renewable energy
- electrification of transport
- circular economy approaches
- conservation and restoration efforts
These show that the structure of growth can change.
The real trade-off
It’s not:
growth vs environment
It’s:
type of growth vs planetary limits
Harmful growth:
- fossil-fuel dependent
- resource-intensive
- waste-heavy
Sustainable (or less harmful) growth:
- low-carbon energy
- material efficiency
- ecosystem protection
- service/digital-heavy economies
Bottom line
- Yes, unchecked, resource-intensive economic growth will damage Earth’s life-support systems.
- No, damage is not inevitable if growth is fundamentally transformed.
The challenge isn’t stopping growth entirely—it’s redesigning it so that human prosperity no longer depends on degrading the systems we rely on.
OK, I asked ChatGPT, Will the pursuit of economic growth damage earths life support systems?
In summary
- Yes, continual GDP growth at current rates is incompatible with maintaining stable climate, clean air, fertile soils, and biodiversity.
- Relative efficiency gains (greener tech, recycling, decarbonization) help but are outpaced by total consumption.
- Sustainable pathways require redefining progress — focusing on sufficiency, equity, and ecological health rather than aggregate economic expansion.
This tension lies at the heart of the current “green growth vs. degrowth” debate, but the scientific evidence overwhelmingly shows that without fundamental economic reorientation, the pursuit of growth will undermine the very systems that make growth — and life — possible.
I guess my question about oil EROEI was too much for ChatGPT to contemplate, without me creating an account. There's nothing wrong with Google AIs answer!
Well if you like Google AI's answer you can feel confident to ask it to critique the article. That's a bit different to just asking it a question.
Also, I didn't think the EROEI question was in dispute if it was referring to one class? Of course it's going down if it's getting harder to extract.
Here is the Google summary for the paragraph
It wouldn't let me submit the full text.
This is an excellent paragraph for explaining the second law of thermodynamics to a general audience, perhaps for a blog, introductory article, or popular science explanation. It hits all the right notes: conservation of energy, the decline of utility, and the inexorable direction of time (irreversibility).
Rating: 9/10 (for simplicity and accuracy)
Here is the Google summary for the paragraph
It wouldn't let me submit the full text.
This is an excellent paragraph for explaining the second law of thermodynamics to a general audience, perhaps for a blog, introductory article, or popular science explanation. It hits all the right notes: conservation of energy, the decline of utility, and the inexorable direction of time (irreversibility).
Rating: 9/10 (for simplicity and accuracy)
My results generally show that the article opens with a valid point and then it's all downhill from there because the whole thing is essentially a non sequitur - the conclusion cannot be deduced from the premises, rendering it invalid.
So, yes, if you input that one paragraph you will get what looks like a fine result.
1. Correct physics → misapplied to global systems
The opening paragraphs restate the Second Law of Thermodynamics and the idea of energy degradation. All true — but irrelevant to the behaviour of:
-
oil markets
-
extraction technologies
-
energy substitution
-
economic systems
-
energy mixes
The Second Law does not tell you:
-
whether global oil supply will rise or fall
-
whether new technologies will emerge
-
whether renewables can scale
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whether societies must collapse
It simply says: all energy conversions have losses. That’s not a prediction about civilisation.
This is thermodynamics theatre — using physics as a rhetorical shield.
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So let's consider an optimistic 'best case' scenario for NZ. Within say the next 10 years, sufficient public and private investment is made to enable
1. Our private and commercial transport fleet to be entirely converted from FF to battery powered EVs, with corresponding upgrades to charging infrastructure
2. Solar PV is installed on all feasible homes (1 million?), say 4kW output average
3. Geothermal, commercial solar and wind generation increases by 30(?)%
4. Huntly is converted entirely to biomass fuel
5. Main trunk line is completely electrified, along with the golden triangle
6. Industrial processes converted from gas to electricty
Would this
1. Solve the dry year problem?
2. Insulate us from external FF supply chain shenanigans?
3. Remove our industry reliance on diminishing natural gas reserves?
4. Help constrain electricity prices for both consumer and industry?
5. Meet our Paris climate goal committments?
6. Make us energy self sufficient?
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