The Contemporary Energy Paradox

A cipher has two meanings.
Blaise Pascal, Pensees, No. 520

Ever since the Oracle of Ottawa was a teenager in the 1970's, Canada has been running out of gas. Back then it was less than ten years of natural gas left. All of us Eastern Bastards were going to be left to freeze in the dark. At the time that was not very good news, especially if you were driving an Oldsmobile Delta 88 Royale, with that small 455cubic inch Rocket motor. For all my European readers that would come out to around seven and a half litres.

Steam Locomotive - Efficiency about 6% (+ / -)

 Nothing has seemed to change today. We have reached peak oil production, but yet, the price of gasoline is about half of the cost of a litre of bottled water. And the natural gas in Canada? It seems there was a bit of an error made in the 1970's, and at present we have a glut of natural gas. It seems that there is ooddles of natural gas in just about all the rocks in Canada. And trust the Oracle of Ottawa on this one, we have more rocks in Canada than you can shake a stick at. It seems that all you have to do is drill deep enough and frack it hard enough and you will get gas bubbling up for decades out of just one boring well. Yes indeed, we are just starving for energy.

From all the hype and marketing of the corporate whores and their owned governments, it seems that we have been deposited by a just, fair and ever loving God into an energy scarce environment. This all has to do of course as punishment for our original sin, The Oracle of Ottawa can't tell you what that all entailed, the Oracle just wasn't around at that time. But we are destined to suffer through it, the Lord has willed it.

Our Creator has deposited human kind on a planet that is composed of over 70% water. Now of course water simply consists of Hydrogen and Oxygen in a pat 2:1 ratio. Have you ever seen hydrogen gas combined and ignited in the presence of oxygen gas? KA - BOOM!! No energy in that at all it seems according to the oil companies. Although NASA has seemed to see the whole matter differently when they are building ballistic missiles and hard on power trips into space. Twists on oxygen and hydrogen just seem to work fine for them....

Gas Turbine - Combined Cycle Efficiency >60%

On top of being dropped on a planet full of useless water, we also have the utter misfortune to be able to breathe the atmosphere of nitrogen and oxygen. Now if you look into it dear reader, you will find that most every thing that goes KA - BOOM has nitrogen in it. But according to my lads at the garage, no energy there. Then there is all that sunshine that falls on most of the Earth every day without fail. Did you know dear reader that of all the sunshine that falls on the lower forty eight United States, not even the American people in all their energy guzzling wet dreams could even put a dent in it if they were able to convert all of it to a usable form. Stupid planet, no energy around at all it seems.

Due to fault by Noah or some other highly placed supporter of the Mosaic Law, the Earth did not come with climate control, it was an option, but somebody typed in the wrong code, you know, same shit, different millennia. The result was that we have these wild temperature differences in most oceans in the world, and all around the world. The potential is so big the Oracle of Ottawa has never even seen a world estimate, you should check out OTEC sometime when you have a chance.

Well, it really seems that if you are doing the capitalist square dance, you don't really get very far in it by asking to many, or rather, any questions. You accept what your so called "betters" tell you, keep your nose close to the never ending demands of the grind stone and be prepared to pay more. We are in an energy scarce environment...