I was having a deep conversation with my four-year-old daughter today and asked her if she thought that transitioning to renewable energy was a good idea or not. She replied: “There’s a spider right behind you!” then ran off, giggling. Lately, the only thing I’ve seen in the energy news is complaints about renewables due to the 3-hour rolling blackout recently in California due to the extreme heatwave and how the US will be a net exporter of oil really soon.
According to the International Energy Agency, we will run out of oil and natural gas in 50 years and coal in 130 years. This is based on maintaining our annual consumption levels of 35 billion barrels of oil with a reserve of 1,700 Billion. The Oil Industry believes that usage will be cut in half by 2050 giving us 20 more years of oil.
My daughter will be 55 when we use the last bit of oil. Is it the right time to tell her? I’m tempted because I feel that she doesn’t completely understand the problem and will smile and run off to find some oil(or bugs) in the back yard.
I’ve done a little bit of research and will share some of what I’ve learned with you in the rest of this article. I’ll try not to bore you too much.
When Will the Earth Run Out of Fossil Fuels?
I’ve noticed in my research that there are two different sets of opinions on this question. My main source of information is the International Energy Agency website(IEA.org) and the Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources 2020 energy study(Link Here).
The one side has many well-written articles about how much technology is improving in oil extraction techniques and finding new reserves 20,000 feet under the ocean. Basically saying that we will never run out because as prices go up, Oil companies will innovate and come up with new ways to provide oil.
The opposite view is that the world is being destroyed due to carbon dioxide emissions. This causes climate change, ocean acidification, pollution on a grand scale, as well as a lot of other terrible problems.
Earth currently has 1,733 billion barrels of proven oil reserves(as of 2019). This excludes 300 billion barrels of oil sands reserves in Alberta. The annual worldwide consumption of oil is about 35 billion barrels.
The most recent state of the industry report from DNV-GL(click this link to go to the report), which is a consultant to the oil and gas industry, estimates that by the year 2050 the use of oil will be cut in half, mostly in the transportation side due the adaptation of electric vehicles. Improvements in extraction technology and efficiency will also reduce the total usage of oil.
If oil consumption and reserves stayed the same, we have enough oil to last 49.5 years(58 years if you count the oil sands). If the Industry experts are correct, which I would believe them because of the amount of money involved, that will give us another 20 years or so of oil.
The estimated coal reserves on earth are 1,069 billion metric tons. The annual coal usage is about 8.5 billion metric tons. With no changes in coal reserves or usage, we will run out in about 130 years.
The Oil and Energy industry research that I’ve read on this subject mostly believes that we worry too much about supplies of oil because of the profit incentive to get oil. It is in the oil industry’s best interest to make sure that they can supply oil at a profit. They will develop the necessary technology to obtain oil from the more difficult regions and oil fields.
One opinion is that we will never run out because of the transition to clean energy. Hopefully, they are correct about that.
Are Fossil Fuels Actually Bad For the Environment?
My goal for this article is not to convince you to immediately sell your gas cars and buy a Cyber Truck to save the environment. Articles and research papers plaster the internet with opposing climate change opinions. I recommend googling the topic if you can spare a decade of your free time.
Coal is from plant material heated and compressed over 100 million years or so underground, causing the chemical reactions that concentrate the carbon into energy-dense blackish rocks.
Oil and natural gas are petroleum products that form from plankton and other animal and plant life that fall to the bottom of the ocean. Over millions of years, this mixture is covered in mud and compressed and heated, which turns the mud into rock and the organic material into oil and natural gas(gas if heated to more than 200 F.
Humanity only started large scale use of coal and oil in the last 200 years. We have 50 years of fossil fuels left. Releasing all the stored carbon that took 100’s of millions of years to sequester and make in such a short period of time will have a big effect on the environment.
Planet earth is an equilibrium system that doesn’t respond instantly to changes. Scientists recently have been warning that the ocean has turned into a giant carbon sink or storage facility. We cannot begin to guess what effect this will have on the future. I guess I can ask my great-grandkids in 2100(not that I’ll live that long).
What Effects Will Population Have on Oil Use?
Population forecasting is another research subject that is well done with millions(or is it 7.7 billion?) different opinions and projections. The consensus seems to be reaching a stable maximum population of 9.5 billion to 11 billion people by 2060 to 2100(depending on the study). Some have the population declining a little.
Another study I ran across estimates that there is enough farming capacity to feed 150% of the current world population. This conveniently comes out to about 11.5 billion people. This, of course, depends on no changes to the farmable land in the world due to climate and environmental changes.
A more technically advanced society needs more energy per person. If you are using robotics for farming or other industrial work the energy cost per person is much higher to support the use of that tech.
According to Ourworldindata.org(link here), the United States’ average energy use was about 80,000 kilowatt-hours in 2019.
The highest energy use was in Gibraltar at 1.5 million kilowatt-hours, the lowest was Chad at 98 kilowatt-hours.
China and India are rapidly becoming first world countries, which will increase energy consumption by a large amount.
Combining a higher world population with one that is more technologically dependent will increase the total amount of energy used. If the oil and gas extraction innovations and alternate energy sources don’t make up the difference in consumption, we will run out sooner.
If we don’t change the way that we make energy significantly by going all out on solar, fuel cell technology, nuclear, and storage solutions, then we will run out of our oil and natural gas before the 50 years is up. If we don’t take this seriously, then in 20 years, the major world powers will be close to war over the remaining oil supplies.
How to Solve the Oil Crisis
Don’t get too excited! This article will not solve anything. I just want to point out how the only real hope we have is to reduce the amount of oil the world uses quickly. It’s easy, and you can personally take part in the solution.
Transportation accounts for about 70% of the annual oil usage. Air travel and shipping are at about 7% each, with automobiles and rail using the rest. A transition to alternate fuel sources needs to be made fast for cars, trucks, and trains.
The good news is that Tesla didn’t die in 2018. Musk single-handedly forced the other major car companies to get on the electric vehicle ride or become irrelevant. Before the Model 3, Electric cars were not being seriously pursued. I went to a Nissan dealership in 2017 or so and laughed at when I asked about the Leaf.
Electrification of transportation has more benefits than you can shake a stick at. There are also many electric vehicle deniers on the internet(and real-life, too?).
Here is a simple calculation:
You commute to work, your car gets 30 mpg. You drive an average of 20,000 miles a year.
Gas is at $3 a gallon.
You will spend $2,000 a year on gas.
Let’s say you can charge an electric car, as I can here in California, at 8 cents a Kilowatt-hour from 9 PM to 3 PM.
Most electric cars have a similar range of efficiency. A Tesla Model 3 has a 78-kilowatt-hour battery with a 325-mile range. Fully charging this car would cost $6.24. Charging this car at a supercharger would cost about $20.
Driving 20,000 a year would cost $360 to $1200.
Internal combustion engines are 20 to 30% efficient, while a battery is about 99% efficient.
Obviously, this article is not an electric car advertisement. You aren’t obligated to go and buy the Cyber truck. You are obligated to think about the future. Mass conversion to electric cars will be a good start to helping with the oil situation. We need to convert in the next couple of years to avert oil wars.
For Further Thought:
We owe it to future generations to get our crap together and start acting like responsible adults with the planet. I firmly believe that we can do it. I think that space travel and the space industry will help us solve many of the problems the earth currently faces.
If we can feed a civilization on Mars with new technology, then we should be able to feed our world. We need scientists and researchers to solve these problems and are excited about the future. Pessimism over running out of oil doesn’t solve the problem.
I don’t want my daughter calling me in 2060 while I’m busy drooling on my nightshirt at the retirement home, accusing me of ignoring a huge obvious problem and explaining how it’s a bit too late to fix the problem. It would have been possible in 2020, but not anymore…and by the way, I’ve downgraded your retirement home service and abolished the bug extermination add on.