Army Foresees Natural Gas Crisis

[jpak]

http://www.defensetech.org/archives/003358.html

The Pentagon has been talking recently about going oil-free by 2050, a fairly radical initiative given the hidebound nature of the institution and the complexity of the technologies it employs.

But oil apparently is among the least of the Army's energy problems.

According to this newly-minted memorandum , the Army's assistant chief of staff for installation management is more worried that the worldwide supply of natural gas will dry up within 25 years. Says the memo:

"Current Army assumption is that natural gas may cease to be a viable fueld for the Army within the next 25 years based on price volatility and affordable supply availability."

<more>

[BayCityProgressive]

1. hm

guess we will just have to close the pentagon then. :)

[Speck Tater]

2. Time for the Army to recruit horse trainers again. (nt)

[brokensymmetry]

3. Important news. K+R (n/t)

.

[Dead_Parrot]

4. But, but...

Greenpeace's energy policy says we can use NG for the next 40+ years, which is why we don't need nuucuuuluuuur power. Surely the army got it wrong? :shrug:

[Egalitarian]

5. Most of us here are familiar with Peak Oil-What about Peak Gas?

Like oil, natural gas is a non-renewable resource which should follow a similar production/depletion curve. But, the technology does exists to convert coal to natural gas, or liquid fuels via the Fischer Tropsch process.

Can someone provide some info. as to current predictions for how long N. American natural gas reserves are forecast to last?

I would not expect the US army to be crying wolf on this one.

I seem to recall reading that 50% of US total energy consumption(including oil) is used for transportation and 50% for heating and electrical generation(I could be wrong though).

What portion of our natural gas is used for home heating vs. electrical generation vs. other uses?

The implicatoins of Peak Gas seem to me to be almost as staggering.

Energy experts please check in.

[LiberalEsto]

7. Natural gas is mostly methane

and cows emit huge quantities of methane as part of their normal digestive process. There are some dairy farms that capture and burn this methane to provide heat and electricity, particularly in Europe.

There are also ways to create "biogas" from solid waste, crop residue, wood pulp and other materials.

I work in the periphery of the natural gas industry, writing marketing case studies on natural gas-fired technologies. I'm told there are huge untapped underground reserves of natural gas, in addition to the biological sources I just mentioned.

As much as I dislike the use of fossil fuels - I strongly prefer sun, wind and wave energy - I think we will continue to have a supply of natural gas in the future, although it will likely rise in price.

[Egalitarian]

9. My recollection is that yes,

we have large amounts of natural gas, but that it is increasingly found in what are known as "stranded" reserves which are expensive to get to market as they are far from existing pipelines/infrastructure necessary to utilize it(again, this is from my not always great memory).

From the same generalist memory, I'm aware that we can utilize biomass and cow dung among other things to create it, but these inputs themselves are currently highly energy intensive.

Fifty years from now, if I'm still here, I wonder how I'll heat my home in the winter? All I know is that our energy mix will be very different from today and much more expensive. Learn to conserve and plan for efficiency.

I'm feeling pretty fortunate tonight. I just got home from a job where I removed siding from a 100+ year old uninsulated home so that the exterior stud cavities could be filled with insulation. Total job cost will be a little over $2000. The payback won't be real fast, but it will pay, probably sooner than we realize. Fortunately, the homeowner is in a position to do the right thing, even if the returns don't fit into the standard "business model" thinking.

[NickB79]

8. There is this site

And a copy of a Reuters story from 2 yrs ago:

http://www.pastpeak.com/archives/2005/06/exxon_natural_g.htm

"Gas production has peaked in North America," Chief Executive Lee Raymond told reporters at the Reuters Energy Summit.

Asked whether production would continue to decline even if two huge arctic gas pipeline projects were built, Raymond said, "I think that's a fair statement, unless there's some huge find that nobody has any idea where it would be." <...>

"The facts are that gas production continues to decline, and will start to decline even more rapidly. By the time we get to that period (2010-2012), we'll need it badly." <...>

[Strelnikov_]

11. More like 'Cliff Gas'

These two links should provide some information.

http://www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/11/8/6636/36918

http://europe.theoildrum.com/story/2006/11/27/61031/618

[n2doc]

6. Hmmm... who has the largest natural gas reserves?

1. Russia
2. Iran
3. Qatar
4. Saudi Arabia

Here we go again....

[Strelnikov_]

10. Yep. The pending liberation of Iran is about them selling our future LNG imports

to Chindia.

[4dsc]

12. US has 10 years of reserves

but that's only half the problem as we use more NG than we can produce. Cananda has peaked too in NG production and would rather waste it on tar sands then reserve it for later use.

That's why the cancellation of the LNG plant in Qatar is really big news for those that follow the LNG process.. Without LNG to make up the difference we are stuck between a rock and hard place..

Peak oil and peak NG are going to make the next decade an interesting one for sure!! Hope you have your lifesavers on!!

[Strelnikov_]

13. GTL conversion of stranded gas as a way to utilize the resource

makes a lot more sense than LNG.

Convert the gas, on site, into a (relatively) clean burning, diesel equivalent that can be safely transported (if you think LNG ships having the explosive power of 20 'Little Boy' bombs is unsafe, that is).