As expected, with gas prices on the rise, public transportation usage is also growing rapidly.  Cities across the US are scrambling to meet the demand.  Trains, buses, subways, ferries, trolleys are all feeling the growing pressure.  According to the American Public Transportation Association:

…more than 2.6 billion trips on public transportation in the first three months of 2008.  This is almost 88 million more trips than last year for the same time period.

In previous discussions on Dump It we have discussed the serious issue of the funding behind public tranportation.  Typically this funding comes from revenue generated from auto tolls as well as consumer sales tax.  The issue is that as fuel prices rise, consumers are spending less and driving less.  This relates directly to less funding for public transportation.  However, at the same time, the demand for public transportation is continues to grow.  X + Y does not equal Z.

Steps toward a resolution to this issue are still up in the air.  The situation described above is not a serious issue for public transportation users tomorrow, however it may be in the near future.  It will depend greatly, as you might expect, on oil prices.  Even if fuel costs settle down I believe this is still a serious concern that should be addressed.  It is inevitable that fossil fuel demand and prices will grow.  If we don’t have a plan in place expect to see a serious problem with all modes of public transportation.

Peak Oil by its most basic definition is a point in time when we are extracting the greatest possible amount of oil from our global reserves. After we reach this peak, the rate we extract oil goes into terminal decline. This means once we reach Peak Oil we will from there on have less oil to provide for whatever demand there is.

The major issue is that the world’s demand for oil has been increasing and that trend does not appear to be changing. In large and quickly developing countries such as China and India, demand for oil will continue to grow because these countries are not focusing on alternative energy sources. Reaching this peak in the world’s capacity to produce oil during these strong growth periods could have major implications on urbanization and standard of living in developing countries. The two issues are directly related to transportation and energy use. Although the US is currently the world’s largest consumer of oil, demand will drop as prices continue to grow. The US also has many resources dedicated to researching and implementing alternative sources of energy.

So how much oil is left? Oil reserves are classified as proven, probable, and possible. These classifications are based on the percentage of certainty that the estimated amount really exists. Peak oil is based on estimates of proven reserves. The chart below from Earthtrends.org shows a map of the world’s proven oil reserves and color codes them by “Years to exhaust” those reserves. This is based on data from 2004.

What does this all mean? From the information in the chart above it looks like we have some time to prepare for a future without oil. The chart map does not take into account growing demand in developing countries. Currently, China’s demand for oil is growing at 8% a year, which would double its demand for oil every 9 years or so. Demand is growing at a similar rate in India. The chart above may look very different taking this level of growing demand from such highly populated countries into account.

There are two basic ways to look at the situation of peak oil, skeptically or optimistically. The skeptics beleive there will be a peak soon in our future and it will have a dramatic impact on the way we live our lives. The optimists beleive we don’t know enough and cannot accurately predict when we will run out of oil, and if we do there are ways around the issue - such as new developments in technology that would allow us to generate the same amounts of energy from smaller amounts of oil. Some optimists ignore the concept of peak oil altogether. In 2008, Abdullah S. Jum’ah, President, Director and CEO of Aramco said,

“We have grossly underestimated mankind’s ability to find new reserves of petroleum, as well as our capacity to raise recovery rates and tap fields once thought inaccessible or impossible to produce.”

With so many uncertainties about how much oil is left, and with many experts telling us we have vast untapped reserves, maybe strains in oil production are based on other factors - politics…? The concept of Peak oil is questionable. I think its comparable to the “green” campaign currently going on. Lots of attention on a small part of a larger issue.

If you have been watching our crude oil price widget you already know that oil prices dropped by nearly $10 per barrel on Tuesday and ultimetly settled at $138.74.  The drop was a result of a speech made by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke.  Bernanke suggested that the high cost of energy is reducing consumer purchasing.  Additionally US businesses are being forced to increase prices to cover their increased fuel costs.

No noticable drop was observed directly at the pump…

MIT has developed a mesh paper called Nanowire that absorbs oil from water. The intended use for the paper is to clean up oil and other organic pollutants. This new technology could play a very important role in oil spills if mass produced. Perhaps the most amazing aspect of this new paper is that is it reusable and so is the oil it absorbs.

Below is a picture of a vile of water with gasoline (dyed blue) that has been removed with with the Nanowaire paper.

Researchers are already looking into how this technology can be integrated with water transfer and filtration systems in large cities to help with purification. Could substantial amounts of oil be pulled from these irrigation systems? Billions of gallons of water are transferred every day in the United States alone. From these billions of gallons of daily water, how much oil could be extracted and re-used?

Additionally, are there other applications where this oil absorbent material could be put to use, such as filtering oil particles out of pollutants?

Remote Reservoir Resistivity, also known as R3M is a relatively new technology used to locate underground oil and gas reserves.  R3M’s technology is based on the simple fact that gas and oil are poor conductors of electricity.  Low-frequency, electromagnetic waves are used to locate resistive underground deposits of the fuel.  The technique allows technicians to map underground and undersea oil and gas reservoirs with ease.

One of the most important improvements provided by R3M is the ability to accurately map fuel deposits without the need to drill.  With R3M, oil and gas deposits can easily be located more than 10,000 feet below the ocean’s surface.

R3M is a tool developed by oil companies to ensure the continued supply and use of fossil fuels.  Innovation is a great thing, but the direction is even more important.  R3M, a technology based on the continued use of fossil fuels does not seem like an answer to many people.  Instead, maybe we should place our finances toward an entirely new focus that will drive consumers to a new energy source.  As usual, the roadblock is a result of finacing (not a lack, rather the source).  Because innovations in this space are driven from oil companies and because consumers still love oil… don’t expect any big changes tomorrow.