Alternatives to Oil

ALTERNATIVES TO OIL

Peak oil is a huge problem that is facing the United States in the near future. Gas prices will skyrocket forcing most people to become self-sufficient. In other words, people are not going to be able to depend on the supermarket to get food. No more dining out, or going to the movies or traveling for vacation. The United States alone consumes nearly 7.5 billion barrels of oil each year. It would practically be a miracle for an alternative to be found and compensate for the forty percent of energy that oil accounts for in this country, and similarly the world. Oil is an amazingly efficient resource. It is transportable, and diverse, but most importantly the profit from selling oil far exceeds the price of retaining and refining it. It is very unlikely that a similar alternative will be found in time.

The most obvious of questions peak oil is going to create is the problem of transportation. Automobiles are the primary source of transportation in the United States. In fact, Americans alone drive over 2 trillion miles every year. If the price of oil gets too high, how will Americans get around? Of course there are the hydrogen powered cars, and the hybrid cars, or even the electric cars, but these are still far from being perfected, and will need oil in one way or another.

The hydrogen powered car uses fuel cells to create power. A fuel cell is a device that creates energy by converting hydrogen and oxygen into water. A car powered by fuel cells would create almost no pollution, and have nearly 80% efficiency. The only problem with hydrogen is that it is very hard to store, and store safely. One can imagine the effects an accident could have on a car with a full tank of hydrogen in the back. There are other options for creating hydrogen though. A reformer takes other fuels such a methanol, and turns them into hydrogen. The problems with reformers come from the emissions. Changing methanol into hydrogen creates impure hydrogen, as well as heat and other gases, changing the overall efficiency from 80% to around 35%. A car with that amount of efficiency is not economical and would not gain a profit from the sales of the fuel.

The hybrid or "hyper" car uses a combination of two or more supplies of energy to power itself. The typical hybrid car is a cross between a normal gasoline powered car, and an electric car. The gasoline engine in a hybrid is much like the engine found in most cars, except it is smaller and it uses the latest technologies to create better efficiency and fewer pollutants. The hybrid can work in two different ways: Either both the gasoline engine and the electric batteries power the car at the same time, or the gasoline engine turns a generator which either charges the batteries or powers the car itself. In this case the gasoline engine does not directly power the car. In fact the hybrid can sometimes turn off its gasoline engine completely, to conserve energy. The average hybrid car will get 20 to 30 miles per gallon more than the conventional internal combustion engine. Although the hybrid sounds like an effective alternative for transportation there are drawbacks. For instance, it takes about 1000 pounds of batteries to create the same amount of energy produced by 1 gallon, or 7 pounds of gasoline. A car weighing an extra thousand pounds would not get many places very fast even if it were to be fully charged.

The electric, or battery powered car has its own difficulties. A fully charged electric car is in the neighborhood of 72% efficient. This is a pretty impressive number, but the electricity to power the car needs to come from somewhere. The 72% efficiency drops to about 40% efficiency when the electricity is generated from a combustion power plant. If the energy lost from charging the car is added in, the efficiency drops to about 26%. There are other factors people are not fond of with the electric car. Most people want a big, fast automobile providing a lot of horsepower, and the electric car does not offer size or speed. There is much room for improvement if the electric car is going to be the next mode of transportation in the United States.

There is one major problem with these alternatives; all of the need oil to be manufactured. Between 20 and 48 barrels of oil are used in the production of one car. With 700 million internal combustion automobiles on the road in this country, supplementing them all for any number of these could use up to 33.5 billion barrels of oil. This number does not sound realistic. If the United States is to change its major source of energy it ought to work quickly. Providing enough energy for the production of goods, generating electricity, providing transportation, and heating houses, does not come from many different resources. There are other options for energy alternative right now, but are they as promising as some claim?

Nuclear power is one energy alternative people are anticipating in the near future. It contributes about 17% of the world's energy, although some countries use it more than others. In France for instance, nuclear power is the primary source of energy, contributing about 75% of their energy. In the United States however, nuclear power is used for only 15% of the energy consumed. A nuclear power plant uses Uranium-235 to power its core. The uranium is formed into rods and then dipped into water. The water heats up rapidly creating steam; the steam is the channeled and forces a turbine to spin. It is the turbine that creates the energy needed to power a city. This is a highly effective method of creating energy. In fact, 1 pound of the uranium-235 can create the same amount of energy as 1 million gallons of gasoline. Unfortunately, nuclear power is a very controversial topic. Nuclear power is very expensive, costing a few billion dollars for a single reactor. There are only about 100 nuclear reactors in the United States at the moment, but it would take about 900 to power the entire country. It has taken the power of oil to mine for the uranium and construct the present day power plants. As oil prices rise, so will the cost of nuclear power. Also, oil is needed for the production of such things as plastics, fertilizer, and pesticides, nuclear power cannot provide these products. But the main problem with nuclear power is the fact that it requires uranium. Despite the resource being radioactive and highly unstable, it is limited. Just like oil, uranium will become scarce, increasing the price of energy and leading to another possible crisis.

Hydro power is another example of a limited resource. There are more than 2000 dams in the United States providing people with electricity. Dams are not a new concept at