Cindy Hamilton wrote:

We're going to have to cut back AND pursue other technologies.
Everybody
is looking for a single answer, and there isn't one.

And so what if climate change isn't caused by human activities? It's
a worthy
goal to not use up every damn thing we can. I'd be giddy if we never
sent another dollar to buy oil from unfriendly countries.


I wholeheartedly agree that we should keep looking. Some things actually
help a bit: Walmart is putting skylights in its stores and reducing lighting
costs during the day. Almost anybody can erect a solar water heater and save
a few bucks a year.

A couple of points about "using up" every damn thing. Starting with the
Romans, much of Europe was denuded of trees and North Africa was turned into
a desert over the need for wood - mainly for charcoal. When the wood
essentially ran out, coal was developed. The industrial revolution was run
on coal.

Just before coal got scarce, oil was found to be a viable substitute.

If the oil runs out, we'll find something else.

The problem with being self-sufficient in oil is: we can't be. Oil is
fungible. Oil from here is much like oil from there, the only difference
being price. If we drill for oil in ANWAR, it'll probably be more profitable
to ship it to Japan than to the lower 48, one reason being the states of
Washington, Oregon, and California won't allow tankers to dock, so the oil
will have to be off-loaded in Mexico then piped through Texas. But that's
okay, because the oil Japan currently buys from Sri Lanka (or wherever) is
now available to us.

Another aspect of this fungibility problem is the malovelence of foreign
suppliers. Suppose a domestic company has to get, oh, $30/bbl delivered to
justify the development of a field. Nigeria or Iran could cut their price to
$25/bbl delivered and put a domestic supplier out of business.

What we COULD do in the short run is develop enough domestic oil supplies to
offset boycotts by mid-east countries. We currently get about 15% of our oil
from Saudi Arabia and its neighbors, so we could remove them as a threat by
relying on domestic production (if we had to). We get most of our
foreign-supplied oil from Canada, Mexico, and Nigeria.

Regarding other technologies: It's possible that alternate forms of energy
can nibble at the margins but many don't stand a chance of doing more. For
example, reliance on solar power is doomed by the laws of physics. The earth
receives about 700 watts/sq meter of energy from the sun. At the equator. At
noon. With no clouds. The only way to increase that value is to move the
orbit of the earth closer to the sun.

Accounting for latitude, cloud cover, hours of daylight, and efficiency of
solar collectors, it would take a "farm" the size of the Los Angeles basin
(about 1200 square miles) to provide enough energy for California. During
the daylight hours. Not counting the immense cost of such a contraption (and
its ongoing maintenance), everybody in Los Angeles would be in the dark!

Which, when you think on it, may not be such a bad idea.