"Peak Oil, AI, and the Straw" | Frankly #56

Recorded March 5 2024
In this Frankly, Nate shares his perspective on the new all-time high in oil production in the context of AI’s growing influence in the financial markets and technology space. While ‘all liquids’ just hit an all time high, the varying categories of what is considered oil obfuscates a long plateau that is starting to decline. However, given AI’s expanding reach, it may not only invent ways of getting a higher percentage of Original Oil In Place to our economies, but also increase demand for energy worldwide. In similar fashion to shale fracking, MMT, and debt, AI will increasingly widen the resource extraction/ecosystem damage “straw”. Artificial intelligence is potentially a wonderful tool, but it is lower down the hierarchy than money/power maximization and thus will accelerate, not diminish climate change and other environmental damages. Can we resist the cleverness of AI and its ability to drain sources to the very last drop to instead navigate the road to the Great Simplification with wisdom?
Special thanks to Art Berman, John Rowan, Kyle Saunders, Tristan Harris, and Daniel Schmachtenberger.
For Show Notes and More: www.thegreatsi...

[@CurtOntheRadio]

I spent New Year's Eve 1999 suddenly worried about what I later found to be called "Peak Oil". Within 6 months the UK was in a petrol crisis and three years later we had the disgrace of Iraq, for which official justification made little sense. I guess that was the start of my 'doomer' perspective. Appreciate the videos, thanks.

[@reuireuiop0]

And still waiting for peak total production. Sure, it is going to happen, perhaps sooner than later, but I expect not much decrease as long as climate breakdown has not affected economy and fossil production. If oil production slowes sooner, it is going to add to breaking the back of economy. Don't see that happening, however, so much easy money to be made from fossil, they gonna squeeze them dry lemon peels until the last molecule. At sixty two, I do not think I'm going to live to see the downfall.

[@wvhaugen]

@@reuireuiop0 As Nate has mentioned often, the shale boom was financed by Wall Street and thus dependent on financialization. It gave us a few more years but the financial aspect points out how dependent we are on debt, especially dollar debt. The war in Ukraine has changed the picture though, as the US keeping the money of Russia and other countries has spurred de-dollarization. Since the global economy is hypercomplex and susceptible to the slightest downturn in money flows, I suspect the speed of collapse will increase. I thought I would "die in my bed with the lights and heat on," but now I am not so sure. And I just turned 74.

[@DanA-nl5uo]

I grew up on a farm spent 20 years as a controls engineer and the last 10 years back on the farm. Nate is underestimating the damage we have done over the last 30 years to the biosphere. It has gotten much harder to cut hay the last 3 years in a row in New Hampshire on the east coast of North America. For 2 years i have held my breath in the fall to see what the harvest reports would be from the bread baskets. Last year we saw countries like India stop all exporting of some grains based on limited harvests. I fear we have passed the damage level to the biosphere and will suffer major crop failures and mass starvation anytime now as crop lands become deserts in some places and flooded out lakes in others. Things have to happen in a very narrow band to get these modern big harvests.

[@skeetorkiftwon]

But how will we afford tiktok dances and block takeovers?

[@sebastienloyer9471]

​@@SRCX.ClimateResearch. Thanks to you. From Alberta North of Edmonton.

[@lophiz1945]

It doesn't really matter in the long term. If you look at the demographics, the earth is depopulating. I am not one of those anti-human types. Just pointing out a factual trend.

[@Zankras]

I don't have the same personal exposure to our food systems as you do, but all of my reading on climate and biosphere collapse has been screaming at me that we're due for multiple bread basket crop failures and yet almost no climate scientists are talking about it. Even many of the doomers don't consider it the most imminent sign of collapse. And as soon as there's massive shortages in the industrial food supply chain, starving humans will go pillage the last remnants of wildlife to sustain themselves just a bit longer.

[@stevealdrich2472]

@@ZankrasI think even those feral hogs, (millions of them in the USA) don't stand a chance, once they become a food supply, rather than just a nuisance.

[@jerryhoefs5803]

Thanks Nate. I've been thinking about these topics lately and agree that we face many "risks". My feeling is that we have already passed many environmental tipping points- CO2, Arctic ice loss, forest fires, methane release, ocean rise, coral reef death and a host of others. If we ceased the activity of the super organism today, the above impacts would continue to grow and threaten our civilization. So lately, given the fact that we have already exceeded 1.5C I'm feeling that we currently face a much greater threat from environmental impacts. I don't disagree with your great simplification ideas, but I do feel that a much more severe accountability is coming. Again, thanks for all of your work and effort and what you're doing to enlighten us.

[@mrrecluse7002]

You're good at revealing the quiet part out loud.

[@jerryhoefs5803]

@@mrrecluse7002 Just trying to stay ahead of an ever steepening curve.

[@bumblebee9337]

@@jerryhoefs5803Bend your knees. That's what my ski instructor said.

[@mrrecluse7002]

@@jerryhoefs5803You and me both. I try to fish out the truth, and I think most scientists may be greatly pulling their punches.

[@triplikeido75]

That's my one real criticism about Nate.. most everything he talks about is true and valuable.. but he seems to be obscuring the fundamental facts about just how f*cked we are. He reliably skirts around the obvious conclusions that the evidence is pointing to: we're well past key, critical thresholds, and there's no going back.. and its getting worse, faster. The heating is now accelerating.. the rise in temps over the past 8 months have been shockingly grim to the point of disbelief. Does Nate really believe that we're just going to peacefully and gradually 'draw down' and 'simplify' over the next 50 years? Surely he knows thats not how it's going to go down... we're about to hit a wall, and billions are going to die in the next 50 years. That's how simplification will happen: global industrial civilization is going to utterly collapse along with everything that depends upon it.. and the vast majority of the earths population is going to die of starvation, violence, disease, suidice and other forms of trauma. This is what will happen. Nate knows this.. but it doesn't make for a nice, regular monetized podcast.. and its a great way to lose your audience, friends and professional peers. Nevertheless.. I know that Nate knows.

[@lionrocklr9217]

Prometheus, your work here is done. Go! Rest!

[@Dante07cid]

One of your best talks Nate. Thanks……. I think!

[@bocadelcieloplaya3852]

i said a couple decades ago that we are gonna run out of environment before we run out of oil.

[@chrisruss9861]

Sadly building wind and solar farms and pumped hydro is contributing to that, but you made a succinct observation.

[@DanA-nl5uo]

I remember telling my grandfather that same thing back in the early 90s. He warned me that I would see a time when farms like ours couldn't function because there would be no diesel fuel. I told him we would destory the biosphere before we pumped the last oil. He thought about it a while and said maybe there are plenty of changes to the environment that he saw in his lifetime. He lived through most of the last century. But the changes are coming faster now.

[@DanA-nl5uo]

​@@chrisruss9861all human activities have an impact on the biosphere. The trick to energy technology is to limit both the impact of the source and to minimize the demand. Things like airlines being replaced with rail travel is important. Complaining about new generation in renewable energy is counter productive. For one thing the off grid home with solar is going to live within that systems capacity. That is a huge win for a society that believes in endless growth. The trick is to limit harm on the down side. The late Michael Dowd was a great source of perspective on that.

[@bluedragontoybash2463]

Until the west run out of country to invade, the world is not running out of oil anytime soon.

[@davidrojas4687]

We will be destroyed by earth before that happens, well have a revolution before we have more expensive products due to gas. Thats what nobody accounts for.

[@tinfoilhatscholar]

Honestly Nate, your videos are getting better lately. Thank you for doing your personal work to make that happen. I hope you will begin to have more open conversations with people from outside of your circle next, and I truly hope, that we, as a species can all begin to see the writings on the wall and start working together to plant the seeds we wish to harvest from. 🙏

[@j85grim4]

Quit dreaming. We are going much faster now than ever right at the iceberg.

[@tinfoilhatscholar]

@@j85grim4 sure, many people are nearly sprinting off the cliff at this point... Meanwhile, there are those of us who have been living the solutions for decades. I've got 25 years of living off the grid at this point, and I don't see any icebergs around here

[@j85grim4]

@@gianpaulgraziosi6171 😂

[@jtjones4081]

Look at the EIA 2023 annual energy forecast. 13 mmbd of crude from now till 2050. No growth. That doesn’t meet our own daily demand.

[@j85grim4]

​@@jtjones4081And that's just one of many problems we are going to be hit with once we hit the ice berg. We have declining male fertility rates which may lead us straight into Children of Men territory.

[@buddypalomo]

Thanks Nate for sharing your great analyses of these topics and the bigger picture

[@dankoepp68]

Looking fresh n fit after India...it shows in the output and depth of the vdos and Franklies

[@liamtaylor4955]

Which make his travel emissions (not to mention the consumption of his fraction of energy & materials) from Wisconsin to India totally worth it to humanity.

[@BobQuigley]

As I was watching your video Washington Post article arrived in my inbox. Heres title and first sentences "Amid explosive demand, America is running out of power AI and the boom in clean-tech manufacturing are pushing America’s power grid to the brink. Utilities can’t keep up." Nate you have ESP 😂. What a mess

[@liamhickey359]

Where I'm from (Ireland) the government in its infinite wisdom gave tax breaks for data centres to open up here. They are already drawing 20% of power out of the national grid. At the rate they are being built they'll be using 70% of the grid by 2030. Apparently the vast amount of this "data" is junk that nobody have use for and will never has use for. The monetary imperatives driving this circus has it's own insane logic. As this is happening , right now this week, the government has put €400 into the bank accounts of the nation's house holders to help them cover soaring electricity bills. This money is no more than a band aid for a lot of people. Somebody's going to have to put up with the consequences of this weird almost surreal set up. Can imagine very well the kind of people who wont be.

[@EmeraldView]

😂 Humans

[@GuyIncognito764]

Good call in 2006 on how we'd redefine "oil". Amazing how stupid we can collectively be as humans.

[@urbanistgod]

I was astounded when I saw this essay.

[@davidcarr2216]

@@urbanistgodDon't be. Humans create (have created and continue to create) fantasy world rabbit holes but all they're really doing is pushing problems out into the future, so we can have a comfortable, fantasy lifestyle right now and into the near future. Humans are assholes - they just can't help it.

[@brushstroke3733]

Like changing the definition of vaccine and changing the formula by which excess deaths are calculated. Just keep moving the goalposts.

[@BobQuigley]

Recently Amazon purchased a small server farm owned by a power company in eastern PA. They plan to ake it a massive server farm. Very close by the same power company operates a 2.1 GW nuclear power plant. Amazon has a decades long contract with the nule plant. At some point its likely to use all 2.1 GW. Yikes

[@wvhaugen]

The Pretenders had a song about "fixing the rich folks' cars and slashing their tires." The rich folks need us peasants. We can use that to our advantage.

[@allonesame6467]

A reliance on "technology" will be our downfall. Center the human experience & reach out to people. Looking forward to your talk about your experience in India. Namaste.

[@chiefofsinners5272]

Concerning AI, (and separate from Nate's point about energy) I believe it was Marshall McLuhan who made the observation that computers are more akin to a nervous system than a brain which made sense to me when I tried to engage it concerning David Hume's problem with induction. It was quick and winsome to respond but brought nothing new to the table, thought-wise, concerning the problem.

[@thurstonhowellthetwelf3220]

I think it's the speed of using masses of information that beats the human brain.. it sort of mimics the creativity .. l take your point.. guess what it does will be the test, not what we call it.

[@chiefofsinners5272]

@@thurstonhowellthetwelf3220 That makes sense. The speed and winsomeness, (it gets me) in how it responds is incredible. The fact that it can't "think" gives me hope that it can be out-thought should one have the time creativity.

[@wvhaugen]

Pick up a copy of Michael Crichton's Prey (2002). It is all about the intersection of biotech, nanotech and distributed intelligence. You can read it in a day.

[@theonemanbandit7374]

I’ve reached peak information

[@r.s.334]

Same people saying same stuff over and over.

[@DanA-nl5uo]

Then it is time to act

[@squeaker19694]

@@r.s.334 and what's the point you're making?

[@wvhaugen]

Good for you. But you can still keep your hand in even though you spend all your spare time in the garden growing your own food. Nate's Franklys are a good aggregator of what is going on out in the world. Sort of like the Utne Reader used to be in the 1990s.

[@snowflakeca2079]

So glad you departed the Lehman Brothers/ Wall Street gig… And are presenting the “Great Simplification” for us all. Your clips are EXCELLENT bridges between: Boomers (may/ may not have oil rights/ fields) Gen Xers (like me, learning about everything late in life because I was too busy supporting myself as a young/ middle aged adult coming from a poor working class family) Millennials who are perhaps the first generation to look “BEYOND OIL” Zoomers who are more young nieces & nephews that I want to steer in the right direction To my “ALPHA GENERATION” 2 boys, who will see things in their lifetimes NONE OF US CAN FATHOM. Thank you.

[@c.oreilly1387]

I think "Omega Generation" is more appropriate.

[@mayviolets]

I learned so much on The Oil Drum back in the day. Very much enjoyed your TOD posts and now your YT videos!

[@Mtnshell56]

Thank you Nate

[@gsnyder2007]

Important information Nate, so thanks for that. I think Peak Oil, and crossing the peak, is yet another reason we can use to convince people we need to shift to other, clean sources of energy! And, yes, nuclear should be on the table along with renewables, geothermal. And we obviously need to go fast. We don't have much time to head off the imminent (and here now) climate disaster while avoiding the economic instability of both climate change and diminishing fossil fuel reserves (available to extract).

[@terryhollands2794]

Excellent concluding statement. I try to resist, especially if the authority lacks transparency.

[@chrisreed5463]

I started watching this video having been out of the PO loop for over a decade. Then thought, Nate Higgins, I remember that name. To my pleasant surprise Nate gets our situation totally. And we've been intellectually separated for over 10 years. Subscribed😊

[@evilryutaropro]

Every day I take life on Earth less for granted and cherish it more. I feel shame in how we treated our sphere of life and how we must’ve angered our ancestors who practiced moderation and tried to temper their greed. It turns out the most valuable things were the things we could never put a price on like nature and virtue

[@cal48koho]

Excellent excellent post. Peak oil is as true now as it was 20 years ago when you and I were posting on it and believing it. It was true then and it's true now...........for "conventional" oil.That was the oil we believed would follow Hubbard's Gaussian depletion curve and it has. We were not contemplating oil sands, ethanol or frac oil. "All Liquids" was not in our lexicon. If AI increases only frac oil then we will have more plastic bags and maybe more gasoline but not more diesel which is the oil that fuels the industrial world. AI might mean more frac oil but not likely more crude oil. My next point is the issue of world chips production where only a few countries produce all the chips in their Fabs and only a single country(Holland) makes the machines, the EUA(extreme ultraviolet) machines. The countries that produce them are South Korea, Taiwan, Japan and China and of course the US. That's it and all of these countries produce only certain kinds of chips, not all kinds.. This is a very fragile situation with most chips made in East Asia. A significant environmental or Geopolitical event could mean a sudden crash in production,' Think war, earthquake for example.What that could do to AI is obvious. Nice job Nate.

[@duncanseath745]

Thank you for your intrepid work Nate. Anyone from South East of England please say Hello!

[@greggregory8311]

You speak the truth, I like your example of lightning as an analogue for A. I. When street lights became mandatory there was an explosion of power stations constructions worldwide. Think of the resource diverted, just to light streets. GREY OUT HUMANITY. I like it!! 🤔🤔🤔 Resistance is futile 😮😮

[@brushstroke3733]

And think of the effects of all that light pollution on humans and wildlife! It keeps us from sleeping as well as we would otherwise (assuming some of it leaks through many of our windows) and it screws up the nocturnal navigation systems of sea turtles, moths, june bugs, mayflies, and probably a million other species.

[@robertgulfshores4463]

Thanks Nate! Wow. Yeah ... good episode.

[@TransitionWhatcom]

Such important insights! Thank you Nate!

[@margaretkneller4670]

thank you for that explanation of the Oils that make up Peak Oil.

[@em945]

He did a full interview last year (I think) with Art Burman with a lot more detail if you have time for greater depth. Really interesting.

[@margaretkneller4670]

yes...I think like You...although I started from the Ecology pov. Meadows and Meadows, limits to growth. They just didn't imagine the innovations in Financialization.

[@TennesseeJed]

Overshoot, that is; deadpools, oligarchs. This is the Great Simplification show!

[@robinschaufler444]

Nate, this was an exceptionally dark Frankly among dark Franklies. I love hearing you speak truth. It's far more calming than seeing peers, colleagues, and people in high places go running from reality. Thank you. Could you please do a roundtable with energy and economics experts together? I'd like to see them pick apart the economic gyrations of this century, their correlations with oil production and prices, and a look at possible causality between them. The Great Production Trough of 2007 which nobody ever mentions coincided with the initial implosion of The Great Recession. The one academic paper I could find examining this coincidence concluded that a coincidence was all it was. No causality either way. I found nothing about recovery from The Great Recession in relation to the knee of the curve in tight oil extraction. The recovery was entirely attributed to the Obama Bank Bailout. Did the Bailout provide the funds to invest in tight oil, causing the fracking boom, or did the fracking boom cause - at least in part - the recovery, or are both true? Nick Hanauer interviewed Aaron Sojourner about current American negative economic sentiment despite strong "fundamentals." Well, there are many other things influencing sentiment, such as still not catching up from the high inflation during recovery from the pandemic, but how is the oil+condensate plateau affecting it? What is the relationship between the plateau and the ever-growing housing shortage? Is there just not enough energy to construct new housing? I assume it's much more complicated than that, but I haven't the tools to pick it apart.

[@wvhaugen]

In the interview Nate did with Joseph Tainter about a year ago, Tainter mentioned that he was worried about collapse in 2008 but then things happened that relaxed his fears. To my way of thinking, the rise of financialization of fracking brought increased oil energy back into the system and prevented the Great Recession from becoming the Greater Depression. (Tainter might even have said that. My memory is foggy.) You might want to check out that interview for yourself. There is other good stuff there too.

[@davehendricks4824]

I, unfortunately, just watched a podcast last night on the Greenland ice sheet. It was melting at a rate of 30 million tons per day. I thought that was a ridiculous amount of melt until they updated the melt rate. It’s now 30 million tons PER HOUR! WHY? All the ash from Canadian wildfires is sitting on top of what was a white surface and now it’s grayish black, absorbing a huge amount of solar heat. Gee, hadn’t thought of that. Sorry about that great news folks.

[@JonathanLoganPDX]

Absolutely! You are correct! What leaves me just stunned is how little the media pays attention to it and when they do pay attention to climate issues they speak about it like it's a page 17 is not front page

[@ppetal1]

Either figure seems big to me. Surely not at the end of winter though? Sounds a bit like attempts at irony by the " more climate nonsense" crowd. Yes, I spend too much time on tinternet.

[@thurstonhowellthetwelf3220]

That's about a 300m cube per hour.....over a huge area..

[@JonathanLoganPDX]

@@thurstonhowellthetwelf3220 I don't understand the point you're trying to make, what do you mean?

[@davehendricks4824]

@@ppetal1 average annual daily melt. To me, that is mind boggling!

[@jefjelten9684]

Good one Nate! I know how it is difficult to talk so frankly. It seems clear to me that peak has happened and as we all said back 10 or 15 years ago on TOD finance has obscured and artificially extended it but not in any way that benefits humanity....quite the opposite. I also see that AI might extend the farce but already it has set back the concept of reality by decades as we can see with NVIDIA and the overall religious belief in tech. Look forward to your finance discussion. Cheers! jef

[@andrearobinson7526]

Thank you as always. Your 'bedside manner' and tone help in the delivery of some tough realities, both now and ahead. Deeply appreciate the time and effort and energy you continue to devote, from a place of genuine care. I often wake up at 3 am with keen clarity that our world is deconstructing and reconstructing in extreme and simultaneous ways. We have to learn a certain kind of 'martial art' as we surf these contractions, expansions and unprecedented conditions.

[@vtfollett]

Nate, I think the most insidious effect of our modern civilization is to rob of us of our human-ness. We’ve given up our remarkable mobility - humans can run down antelope - to machines. We prefer canned entertainment to our own voices. We pay others to play our games for us. And we’re about to turn over at least part of our greatest skill to machines. I’m no luddite, but I fear it’s a loss we won’t survive.

[@TimFrench-tx1xj]

Great! Thought provoking. Thanks

[@stephenboyington630]

Well, if it isn't my old nemesis, The Straw.

[@Dartagnan65]

I drink your milkshake!

[@edybrasfield1345]

Thanks Mr. Nate for sharing your wisdom with us. Blessings

[@harrybarrow6222]

The good news is that renewable energy (wind, solar, tidal, …) is now CHEAPER than fossil fuels. Of course, renewable is better with energy storage, which can be done with pumped hydro as well as various types of batteries (easily available sodium can replace lithium). It is good that we have hit peak oil as we reach critical climate temperatures. If the average temperature rises only a little more, there is a real danger of runaway warming. The permafrost is already thawing and as it thaws, it is releasing methane. Methane is about 29 times more effective as a greenhouse gas than CO2. We are at a very scary threshold. (PS I did research in the oil industry for 20 years.)

[@justcollapse5343]

Wind and solar are all made with, from, and by, oil. So called 'renewable' energy plants cannot create more renewable energy plants -this greenwashing of alternate energy is possibly the biggest lie on Earth. 1)They only add to energy supply (they do not displace it), 2) are not clean, not 'green' and, 3) only serve to facilitate ecocidal "...business as usual by alternate means". - Prof. Bill Rees

[@robertinget1613]

Thanks Nate.

[@noitalfed]

Your observation that NVDA is now valued more than all the energy companies in the S&P 500 suggest to that NVDA should be sold and energy blue chips should be bought. NVDA is too high, energy too low.

[@bipl8989]

You are right. I don't yet see evidence that AI will markedly increase oil production. It may get a bit more, or a bit faster, but the fields are still declining. AI will be better used in developing alternate energy sources. If it concentrates on oil, we just hit the wall faster and harder. And right, price these days is 10% fact and 90% hype.

[@kevinmeyers2611]

Why would you quote Elon Musk for anything? The guy is completely mad.

[@CyanAblaze]

He is not a technical person, but what he says is a barometer for what Silicon Valley is doing, or trying to do.

[@NathansHVAC]

Elon invented AI and founded Open AI by finding Sam Altman and putting together his team to develop on the released google document that drops meaningless words to increase language model compression.

[@scott76252]

1 barrel of oil is 42gal A steel drum is 55gal A steel drum is 3ft tall A mile is 5,280ft The circumference of the earth is 24,900 miles If you converted the daily world oil consumption of 100,000,000 barrels to drums and stacked those drums end to end how long would this string of steel drums be??? (100M x 42gal) / 55gal = 76,363,636 steel drums (76,363,636 x 3ft) / 5,280ft = 43,388 miles long 43,388 miles/ 24,900 miles = 1.74 times around the earth 🌍 every day. We have nothing capable of replacing those BTUs and products. For example, tar is about 2% on average of a refined barrel of oil. How many barrels of oil had to be pumped from the ground to make the asphalt capable of paving all the highways and parking lots across the earth?

[@brushstroke3733]

And how much have all those paved asphalt roads and driveways contributed to atmospheric warming and to rainwater runoff and the resulting pollution of water ways?

[@scott76252]

@@brushstroke3733 depends. Bacteria breaks down oil. There is an estimated tanker’s worth of oil that naturally seeps into the Gulf of Mexico each year. Bacteria breaks down that oil. In down town Los Angeles are the Labra Tar Pits that seeps heavily oil and gas into pools/ponds. They have a fly, labra tar fly, whose larvae live off of eating the tar.

[@lophiz1945]

I used to follow the Oil Drum back in the day. Peak oil no longer concerns me. When the time of insufficient carbon energy arrives, society will begrudgingly turn to an ever greater source of power. Nuclear fission. Watch how quickly negative attitudes reverse when the prospect of a cold winter is imminent. Humanity is very plastic. Nuclear energy, such as the renewed interest in molten salt reactors as well as other fission technologies, has advanced to the point that humanity really should not be existentially concerned about peak oil. Yes, there will be unpleasant, begrudging transitions to be made, but reality cannot be ignored forever, even by politicians. We will all be like France. Interesting video.

[@johnbrzezinski1446]

But you don't address the impacts of global warming and other polycrisis issues. I suppose that billions will perish as a result of unbearable heat, floods, crop failures, gang killings, etc., but that doesn't matter a bit to the super wealthy. They will simply arrange for the nuclear waste to be buried in the nearest impoverished neighborhood.

[@brushstroke3733]

And what will power our DeLoreans? Mr. Fusions?? Or will we all have electic cars and if so, where will we source all that lithium and other metals from? And will those electric cars work well in cold weather, towing heavy loads when necessary??

[@philtimmons722]

Nukes were last century. Most of the world is moving on to Mr. Fusion in the Sky -- Solar PV, that is. Solar PV is now the largest new build in the real world US, 2024. Meanwhile Nukes are shutting down (Peak US Nukes = 104 Reactors, down to 94 Reactors in 2024). No utility wants a New Nuke -- they are now: Most Expensive, Slowest, Long-Term Dirty, and Highest Risk new generation, EVER.

[@philtimmons722]

@@brushstroke3733 Long-Term Electric Transport is not even battery based. With Electric Roadways, vehicles draw power directly from the Grid Connect Roadway. Here is a truck, in the snow. Example >>> kzbin.info/www/bejne/aGiUYWOrbK6Wf6s

[@matosmond4519]

Thanks, as ever. The comparison of AI-to-human cognition with that of Oil-to-human physical energy brings home quite forcefully - if Ive understood correctly - the terrifying implications of the AI-human differential continuing to increase exponentially, unlike the relatively constant differential in the case of oil.

[@wvhaugen]

Well Nate, this is your best Frankly ever, in my opinion. Early on you hit on what is the real solution to peak oil and our biophysical limits. At 2:30ff you mention 1700 kWh in a barrel of oil and .6 kWh in a human. Then you say that the ratio is not quite that exact because humans use their muscle power more efficiently. This is NOT just a throwaway comment vis-a-vis the efficiency aspect. In my first book (The Laws of Physics Are On My Side, 2013), I approached this from a biological anthropology focus and pointed out that what makes us so efficient in energy use is bipedalism and the opposable thumb. [These predate increased brain size by the way.] It is not just the storage and release of energy in the pendulum motion while walking, but the narrow trackway too. The human organism is the most efficient engine we have. The human organism can grow its own fuel too. This is the solution to the future. Live simply at a human scale and use manual labor to grow your own food, build your own houses, travel from place to place, etc. Later on in the video, you talk about productivity and AI, mentioning the "productivity bump" of the Internet. This was a case of distributed intelligence harnessing an increasing supply of cheap oil energy. We don't have an increasing supply of cheap oil energy now, so I have my doubts on how far AI can go. We just have a bigger straw, as you and Art Berman say. What I DO see is the increase in slavery and it is already happening. Even someone as trendy and superficial as Joe Rogan has mentioned that we have more slaves now than we have ever had in the past. [In an absolute sense, not in a relative sense as a percentage of population.] All state-level societies have had slaves. [And even some tribal societies!] Since the 1860s we have just substituted cheap oil/coal energy slaves for the human slaves. Now that cheap oil is gone and expensive oil is here, we will return to slaves more and more as the price of oil becomes unmanageable. The elites require it. This is our future. A return to slavery. If you and your viewers want to slip this nightmare of the future, I suggest dropping out as much as you can. Even then, you may be tapped as the head slave on the plantation of your local ganglord. Many people feel they are in this situation already. They are not wrong. If YOU would have listened to US fifty-five years ago, WE wouldn't be in trouble NOW.

[@wvhaugen]

@@karlkessler6017 Kilowatt hours are convertible to joules, kilocalories, BTUs and horsepower. There are conversion tables and calculators online. Thus 1700 kWh = 6.12 gigajoules of energy and .6 kWh or human energy = .00216 gigajoules = 2160 kilojoules = 516.252 kilocalories. Here is a good definition of kWh for you. "The kilowatt hour is a composite unit of energy with 1 kW⋅h being equivalent to 1 kilowatt (1 kW) of power sustained for 1 hour. One watt is equal to 1 J/s. One kilowatt hour is 3.6 megajoules, which is the amount of energy converted if work is done at an average rate of one thousand watts for one hour." Nate is talking about the energy you expend when you burn a barrel of oil and (presumably) the energy expended by a human doing some sort of work in 8 hours or 64.5 kcal/hour. These are conventional numbers often used on the Web, but I think the value for a human is too low. The calculation is also kinked because work is all about doing tasks and very little time is spent sweating and grunting. [The working day, whether in an office or on the farm is not like playing soccer or running all day long.] My calculation is 125 kcal/hr throughout the waking day of 16 hours (2000 kilocalories) and 500 kilocaloris for 8 hours of sleep. I checked this calculation, while writing my first book, by wearing a heart rate monitor with a chest strap and doing my usual 12 hours a day of farm work. My calculations were within a 95% confidence interval. You can do the same experiment yourself. Get a heart rate monitor with a chest strap (Polar makes good ones) and just wear it all day long. You should be able to set your readings for either kilocalories burned or watts produced. Divide by hours wearing the strap for the rate per hour. The point here is that work and power are a red herring for dealing with the effects of fossil fuels on the environment. It is all about the energy expended, which generates heat and gases into the environment. Many analysts, wittingly or unwittingly, confuse the issue in an attempt to flog their latest product, whether it is renewable energy, EVs or some other product where they do not do a REAL energy accounting. The calculations also get kinked because some of the 6.12 gigajoules of energy in a barrel of oil get wasted turning it into gasoline, kerosene, etc Nate and Art Berman have gone into this in depth. Finally, check out this calculation. 8.095 billion people on the planet, at 2000 kcal/day, produce the equivalent of burning 11.072 million barrels of oil in heat discharged into the environment every day. Every day. This is 98.3% of Russia's production of 11.263 million barrels of oil per day. So . . . the population of humans on this planet expends almost the same amount of heat as another Russia. Clearly, the overpopulation of this planet, especially the overpopulation of wasteful Americans, is a huge problem. As I have been saying for many, many years now, the laws of physics are on my side. I never had children for this very reason.

[@wvhaugen]

​​​@@karlkessler6017 My earlier reply didn't make it past the censors, so I will be quick with this one. Power = energy over time. Kilowatt hours can be converted to joules of energy. In other words, how much heat is expended if you burn it (oil) or move about doing something (humans). 1700 kWh = 6.1 gigajoules of heat expended into the environment. .6 kWh = 2160 kilojoules, which is actually too low. A human actually expends 2000+ kilocalories per day or 8368+ kilojoules/day. The heat expended by "generating power" or "doing work" is the problem. You wouldn't be the first one to be confused by this. Consider this: the heat expended by 8 billion humans each day, whether working or not, is nearly equal to the amount of oil produced by Russia each day (which is burned to generate power). Over 11 million barrels/day. Efficiency is another topic, but you can measure how much heat you expend doing work by human power or fossil fuel power. The human wins hands down.

[@wvhaugen]

@@karlkessler6017 Yes efficiency is an attribute of a power conversion system, which speaks to my first post. Keep in mind that the energy in a barrel of oil can be converted to power, just as the energy in a human can be converted to power. The human is a store of potential energy, just as the barrel of oil is. You can say that the human is the engine that uses fuel (food) to do work and is more akin to a car engine rather than the fuel that powers the car, but that is just niggling over terms. Nate's overall point is that we get more power from fossil fuel energy to do work than human energy applied to do work. This has proven to have a HUGE downside over the last 200 years. My point is that we can mitigate our present polycrisis by adopting manual labor to get things done because we are more efficient than engines that run on fossil fuels. This is not a game of one-upmanship over terms. It is a concerted effot to get people to change their behavior.

[@ralphwilliams8139]

AI is a better straw at mining the key resource of the internet - the storage and cataloguing of human creativity , scientific and cultural knowledge. and refining it into easily processed forms for direct use. In other words a better internet search engine. What it is not is a source of creativity or (as yet) new knowledge beyond some relatively niche scientific areas like protein structure analysis and new drug design. As more and more of the content of the internet is generated by AI itself, its original creative content will be diluted, and AI will end up canibalising itself, and using AI content as its input data. This will rapidly, probably exponentially corrupt the quality of its output. This will destroy most of the value of the internet, and further accelerate our decline towards the post industrial era.

[@DanA-nl5uo]

I personally can't wait to see how Tesla and SpaceX factories function once Elon gets his robots trained by Twitter now X. He has said his robots are close and that he bought Twitter to data mine for AI. So his Twitter trained robots running his factories should be a good test of AI.

[@brushstroke3733]

Thank you for that bit of hope!! Great perspective. I hope you're right.

[@davidcarr2216]

Good one Nate.

[@ninga1154]

Good morning Nate I'm am glad am at my age of 65 lived comfortably so far but I really worry or my neices and there children what did we leave them a blue shit hole but we try to keep fighting thanks Nate

[@EmeraldView]

We left them worse than nothing. But you can't blame any one individual. It's been generations of humanity.

[@thecount3965]

Yep I think you are spot on about the peak oil demand being higher for longer now we will be building data centres etc. the implications for interest rates are under appreciated too. I think we will have another wave of inflation and increased rates due to countries/companies borrowing lots of money at any interest rate (due to returns on ai being so high) to build nuclear powered data centres and other ai related infrastructure

[@Glowbetraveler]

Nicely explained. It seems as if there was 10 times more oil during its early years of discovery,civilizations would of developed much earlier in history only due to it abundance and easier access.

[@shannonwilliams7249]

Great segment man. Thank you.

[@cesarpulgarin4046]

Excellent ! Many thanks Nate

[@grahammewburn]

The discovery of oil peaked in 1964. I was 16 then. I'm now 75. According to Rystad Energy, discoveries are now below 10 billion barrels PA. Mankind consumes 36 billion barrels PA. Unsustainable.

[@vincentkosik403]

Lucky too be 75

[@brushstroke3733]

Thank you for the good news! There's hope for humanity after all!

[@grahammewburn]

@brushstroke3733 Yes, there will be survivors. Sadly, many think our unsustainable way of life will continue long into the future. I hope I'm wrong and they are right.

[@brushstroke3733]

@@grahammewburn I hope you're right. Because if we keep going the way we're going, the military/industrial/pharma/tech/media/government complex will have us all tightly in their grasp (they already do.) I think the only thing that might stop Big Brother from becoming an even scarier entity than Orwell imagined is running out of resources to power the superorganism.

[@pascalxus]

but wait, our energy consumption already peaked in 1998 according to art Berman. Also, if you use a realistic measure of inflation such as the case shiller housing index you'll see that real GDP in America also peaked at about the same time, so why is everyone still using official GDP figures? The official GDP figures are based on the incorrect CPI, so they don't tell you anything . The case shiller index measures the cost of housing quite objectively and since the latest generation uses over 50% of their income for housing, you really don't need a basket of goods anymore. We need to start using nominal GDP/ Case shiller as a means of calculating real GDP.

[@oliviachipperfield6029]

Fantastic. Thank you!

[@cynthiaparker6901]

Greetings! I love what you are doing, as well as many others you have interviewed. One such person is Daniel Schmachtenberger. I have seen/heard little from him this year. You've mentioned on more than one occasion that he is a friend. We do not wish to invade his privacy. Please pass along that my spouse and I just hope he is well and wish him many blessings. Thank you!

[@jjessicalynn]

Gulp 😳 ..

[@vincentkosik403]

Burp

[@squeaker19694]

I imagine that the energy required for the green transiton will also be huge

[@bumblebee9337]

The amount of energy being devoted to the green transition should be popularized. It would be a telling metric.

[@ppetal1]

@bumblebee9337 we're well into extreme energy with coal and then there's the true cost of fracking. But you're right.

[@DanA-nl5uo]

What do you purpose for an alternative?

[@squeaker19694]

@@DanA-nl5uo humans using energy only for essential things so that we have enough for the transition whilst using less total energy overall. We should also not delude ourselves that transitioning to rebuildables(renewables) means we'll be able to go back to our extravagant use of resources because it will not provide us with enough energy to do that. Which is a good thing because the more energy we have, the more we trash the environment. I personally am happy to live in a mud hut surrounded by a large permaculture garden.

[@squeaker19694]

@@bumblebee9337 yes, it would be good to know this figure in terms of an overall percentage and how much Co2 it will produce.

[@jivefive99]

If the oil is finite and (we) peak oilers were right in 2007, we need to continue to move quicker toward electricity via nuclear and solar and wind, and hope that market forces (higher prices) will raise the cost of oil and electricity in such a way that a LOT of waste is squeezed out because gas and the volts cost more than they used to. That might buy us another 100 years ... price oil and gas higher and stop wasting all this sunlight, wind and uranium.

[@stefanbernardknauf467]

Hi Nate! To counter what you generally hear from Germany, maybe you should have a look at Ulrike Herrmann. Very interesting women, I would say possibly the future German Jean-Marc Jancovici. All her stuff that I have seen so far is only in German however. She has a peculiar definition of Capital, which actually is industrial technology in my books, but she has a very clear view on German and world situation and she is working hard on a future degrowth scenario. Actually the best I've seen so far, though I'm afraid she's falling short, it won't work. But, coming from this green transition intellectual desert which is current Germany this is remarkable. Have a nice afternoon!

[@benburrows9722]

We need to no the limits of man. We need to no the limits of Earth's resources. We need a energy revolution!

[@iceman7207]

All I can say is: Olduvai Theory. Love your work, Nate.

[@bentray1908]

The latest fracks take 4 tons of sand per foot

[@DanA-nl5uo]

Those hidden numbers blow my mind when you hear the oil industry fear mongering about mining requirements for batteries. Tons of finger pointing to distract from their own impacts.

[@stephanecloutier181]

I have heard a couple years ago that there is a worldwide sand shortage incoming for construction (mostly concrete making and roads construction). I had no idea fracking was using sand as well. That being said, it may not be the same suitable construction sand that is required in both fields, but I am leaving this comment here, if someone informed could enlighten me if thoses 2 applications pull on the same sand supply

[@mydogdidit]

@@stephanecloutier181 Around here, the nat gas shale drillers use massive quantities of sand, yes, but they come from new river sand mines/plants built for their industry. Several up and down the river, is mind-boggling how much sand is used for the entire field.

[@dylane.worden7320]

Collapse now and avoid the rush. Luckily have dropped my family energy usage by 85% already to adopt to peak oil.

[@buddyneher9359]

Locutis of Borg! But I think in your heart, Nate, you believe that Resistance is Fertile.

[@dalewolver8739]

AI Making debt slavery even more efficient

[@wvhaugen]

Best comment I have seen so far!

[@ouimetco]

Wow Nate you are on top of this. Impressive.

[@jimsummers487]

We should definitely buy Greenland now

[@innercityprepper]

Probably not a popular opinion, but I really don't see the proof that AI is such an exponential game-changer other than allowing corporations to lay off employees. So far it all reeks of marketing hype.

[@odderlendsolvang3790]

it needs lot of energy.

[@nigelwilliams7920]

Indeed: “Long live peak oil”! The decline will be comprised of the drops off a series of Seneca Cliffs, and as we fall off each one we will discover how interconnected things were; the more bluffs we tumble over the faster we will fall. Black swans like the closure of the Suez Canal, collapse of the AOMC and unlivable temperatures in oil production regions will all add confusion to the mix.

[@troygoss6400]

The insanity of humanity is without comparison.

[@amrenmiller6053]

When I think about the 'insanity' of industrial civilization, I can't help but observe that while humans may in and of themselves be crazy, I have a distinct feeling that there is a group that sits on top that pushes even more craziness on everyone else to benefit themselves.

[@deepashtray5605]

This is the basic plot for roughly half of all futuristic dystopian anime.

[@Eudamonia-123]

Excellent analysis. Not sure I’m all in, but there is definitely food for thought.

[@benburrows9722]

Time to get that fusion reactor working.

[@EmeraldView]

So we're doing pretty good, eh?

[@tjarlzquoll9835]

It sounds like AI could facilitate us going down the less desirable RCP 8.5?

[@briannewman6216]

More stuff that is not conventional oil will be produced to replace the conventional oil that is not being produced. The production of conventional oil alternatives could go on for a long time. The key issue will be the cost of producing the alternatives compared with the historical cost of producing conventional oil.

[@brushstroke3733]

Nuclear is about the only alternative we currently have that is stable and reliable. Renewable sources are small and much more intermittent based on availability of wind, sunlight, etc. And we don't yet have portable nuclear energy. Thank the stars! The only thing that may stop Big Brother from controlling us all may be lack of energy.

[@alliecravulz]

I like the animations, well done.

[@tonycerviver2123]

The problem is all these suburb's that people have to commute to on a daily basis. I got out of that rat race and now I barely buy a 1/4 tank a week. If we can eliminate the daily torture that people endure driving excessively, then we can make a difference. Promote incentives like ride sharing, bus, public or private transit. Anything besides the norm.

[@urbanistgod]

The problem is overpopulation. Living in a suburb is the best way to live.

[@13thbiosphere]

It looks like EVs arrived just in time EVs arrived just in time

[@PhilipWong55]

Energy Density Megajoules/kg Oil 44 Coal 24 Fission 81,000,000 from Lithium Hydride, Deuterium Fusion 270,000,000 from Uranium, Thorium

[@alonsogonzalez9997]

I agree that we have done a lot of damage to the environment as a whole. I believe the best years for humanity are ahead of us. Disruption’s are the constant in town and therefore, uncertainty and anxiety about the future. I have found out that during disruption’s, using the past or history is a bad teacher because history does not repeat itself. We are leaving the most exciting of times.

[@everythingmatters6308]

See Sid Smith or Bill Reese.

[@grizzz6884]

@19.21 . the ai will also mean a lot people never leave their house , which will mean , they can cut back a lot of every day car use , allowing them to cut back on building and maintaining roads ,

[@westerntexter]

You're on a roll Nate ! Keep it up and help us all get through this Peak Oil/AI Bottleneck of the next decade and beyond.

[@dan2304]

The materials needed to transition to low emissions energy are only available for a small fraction of current global population. The consequence is that fossil fuels will be used with reducing net return to economic depletion within a few decades, when the cost of supply of commodities is more than the ability to pay. The consequence is that global warming will continue to accelerate, warming will exceed 4 C with 2-3 m sea level rise before 2100.

[@stephenboyington630]

AI is just fracking for money. Trying to find sneakier ways to make profits, regardless of the product or service. It is horrifying. Trying to more quickly turn natural resources into dollars, future be damned. The People will see through that, and put a stop to the madness.

[@Avianthro]

As Jevons "paradoxified": Efficiency up. Consumption up. AI increases labor productivity (but not necessarily productivity per unit of energy input in the economy, since AI needs so much energy itself) and then we, the investor class (Life's power-up instinct) and workers (Capuchins) put out of work by AI seek to find new things to do, to increase our economic output and consequently the inputs to support that too. Meanwhile AI destroys our humanity in the name of making our lives "better". AI is the super-modern Tower of Babel...Physics will judge.

[@alonsogonzalez9997]

Hello. I think the basic premise of Art Berman that we are in pick oil and gas, mostly due to supply constrains and that renewables will not going to be able to pick up the supply constrains is wrong to begin with. I believe in energy abundance from abundant energy sources like the sun and not from scarce resources like fossils. If that is the case, the whole thesis is wrong. I would love to debate the premise !

[@jenniferspring8741]

Don’t let the gains in perspective made in India get extinguished by the bad news! Stay on the highroad (attending beyond the overdeveloped culture/hyper rational perspective), not too many people are sharing that information!

[@annethacker8292]

Thank you Nate...I agree completely with the left brain scenario regarding AI...Kind of hoping for a Financial Simplification before we get too far down the Mordor road...Wondering if you have any thoughts about the book/ documentary The Great Taking by David Webb? All the best and hope you have fully recovered from Covid!

[@realeyesrealizereallies6828]

My DIY solar batteries which consist of 48 EVE cells wired as three 16s 48 volt batteries and have 45 kilowatts of power, which my 6,000 watts of solar panels keep charged up and powers my life..The Inverter/solar charge controller is the EG4 6,000 XP...The system is completely DIY and off grid..and cost a little less than $8,000, and will certainly last 20 years..Which is about $30 dollars a month..A dollar a day..Which anyone mostly could do..I have power during power outages, and have way more battery storage than I need..I've down sized my power consumption drastically, but live a complete modern life, and sacrifice nothing..We are not escaping the consequences of 8 billion people degrading the natural systems that have allowed life to evolve and thrive..The damage is just too much to overcome..So, adapt now, while the opportunity is here..The adaptation window is tiny and fleeting quickly..

[@your9nemesis]

AI seems to increasingly collorate with green/intermittent energy. Witch would be a good thing we're it not that both are subsidiced by public money. AI just like Blockchain and personal optimisation can adjust it's energy usage based on local and temperal energie availability or pricing. Seems datacenters will be increasingly in use were weather based energy is a large part of the energy production.

[@mpetry912]

we are now on the "bumpy plateau" that follows the peak and before the more precipitous decline after about 2030

[@bonnittaroy]

Maybe watch (or re-watch) The Big Short to understand why NVIDIA is "worth" more than all the energy compaines combined. The protocols for finance are not correlated with "real world relationships."

[@tinoyb9294]

Seems to me that peak oil should be calculated by subtracting the amount of energy/oil needed to extract oil from actual oil production to get net oil production. Let's see a graph of that number.

[@philtimmons722]

That confuses Energy and Oil. They are very much NOT the same thing. Oil has value not because of "Energy," but because it burns in the existing fleet of ICEs (Internal Combustion Engines). Most Oil (about 70%) goes just to feed ICEs. Replace ICEs with Electric Motors, and most Oil goes worthless. Most Oil that goes into the ICE path just produces waste heat. By mixing and misunderstanding actual use of Oil (mostly waste) and "Energy" lead to the goofy concept of EROEI.

[@braeburn2333]

AI is the height of complexity. It won't work without thousands of industries and specialized workers to support the technological systems needed for AI to function. How many parts are there in a server cloud for instance? AI will be the first to go away when the dollar is rejected for payment in the producing countries. Will those technicians keeping the AI components working come to work when their family is starving and they have to go stand in line all day for some sporadic gov cheese? AI is not going to last long in the great simplification, in my opinion.

[@peterbedford2610]

The loss of 3% of insect life per year is really astounding to me. But, the food chain effect for nature has got be showing up in population counts of many species

[@zwhitehead403]

Can someone explain how the 0.6 KWh is measured? Is this, how many KW a human can produce for an hour, because that's one hell of a human. Put a normal working person on a bicycle attached to a power generation measurement device, and they could only produce around 0.1 KW for an hour, they'd also be awful tired after that hour. In addition to that, a pedal driven generator is probably the most efficient way a human could produce energy. Tour De France riders would be killing themselves to keep production at 0.6 KW for 1 hour. Maybe I'm not thinking about this correctly, but as a cyclist and an electrician, this is what I came up with, and to me it's giving the human way too much credit.

[@achenarmyst2156]

Could advanced cognition (like AI) understand and value holistic and emotional “right brain” world views and steer us towards degrowth? That said, cognition alone should normally steer us in that direction if not hampered by dopamine, narcissism and psychopathy…

[@RickLarsonPermacultureDesigner]

Automatically Incompetent with your point in mind.

[@leos3003]

Has it occurred to anyone that we've been pulling all sorts of stuff from the ground and burning it, turning heavy matter in to air. You think it changed anything about the earth or gravity may be?