Hint: Look up the definition of troll. [xx(]
He hadn’t posted any of his imaginations for a while, and thought that it was time to irritate us again?
Perhaps we should just ignore any future post that he makes, even though he will probably not go away.
Johnny, you must have missed the stuff he started (again) on Maglev rail. But ignoring his stuff is the right thing to do.
No, Schlimm, I didn’t miss it. I thought that he was pretty well scotched for not being able to answer the questions about some of his assertions.
A friend of mine in college (whom I have not seen since he graduated, in 1956) was working on a maglev project (in California, as I recall), which came to nothing. Three or four years ago, I asked our physics professor what he knew about the project, but he was not able to tell me anything.
The Peak Oil theory was advanced by a geologist/geophysicist M. King Hubbert, while working for Shell Oil in the 50’s. He was well familiar with the resource, however, his theory has been hijacked by people with philosophical bents from one extreme to the other, who are more versed in politics than resources. His theory was a useful tool, but like any tool, it can be misused. Like many life cycles, it follows a roughly bell-shaped curve. The theory is that production won’t spiral down, but follow a gradual diminishing curve. And as you have, he talked about other forms of energy replacing it.
New oil sources are found, however, often at a much higher price point. New technology like lateral drilling, massive fracking, and tar sand extraction, are almost an order of magnitude more expensive. The ramp-up in prices is the only thing that made the technology affordable.
Aside from any uncertainty about when a peak may hit, or what a decline curve might look like, I agree that rail is the best utilization of the fuel we have now.
IIRC, one of the solutions to find another resource was American trees. The colonists could not chop down certain trees above a height limit, because they needed the trees for ship building and put in place that law. A small part of the dissent that led to the USA.
And now back to the thread…The OP’s opening comments was that railroads would suffer from the end of oil because they use primarily diesels. It may actually help, as once electrification is made cost effective, it will probably be done. Roads, ships and planes are much harder. Electrification can use almost any fuel. The free market will find a solution.
Interesting! First “easy to get trees” then “hard to extract trees” and finally, iron and steel.
+1
Yup. Tempest in a teapot.
I found it! The law was the Pine Tree Law:
I do not remember for certain, but I think that other naval stores, such as pine tar, were also a preserve of the English government. Of course, pine tar was obtained more easily that the trees of suitably large diameter were.
And then along came George Brett and his home run and the real Pine Tar War started with the Yankees![:D]