[Second_in_pie]

Isn't petroleum formed through the accumulation, burial, and transformation of organic material—such as the remains of plants and animals—by chemical reactions over long periods of time? In other words, couldn't we make oil from our organic garbage? But do we have a million or so years?

Yes, but even with technology, it would take a very long time to make oil out of our waste. It would make a lot more sense to build facilities to produce, store and distribute hydrogen rather than make facilities to slowly make oil (which even with technology might take tens or hundreds of years.)

The future will have to become oil free, mainly because we have little choice otherwise. The best option is to create a stronger footing on public transit and active transportation than we have now. The remaining cars of the world would either run on Electricity, Hybrid-Biodiesel or Hydrogen. I think I saw an interesting study that concluded that solely switching to hydrogen is not a viable option. With our current numbers, only something like only 1/4 of all cars in major cities (Toronto included) would be able to run off hydrogen, as the water produced as a by-product would actually have adverse effects on our cities climates
So when you factor in growth and those such things, the best option is to have a majority of the public using public transportation, with electric cars running for people exclusively living inner-city that require a car for some reason or another. Hybrid-Biodiesel and Hydrogen would be used mostly by those who travel longer distances or require a higher horsepower (the best option would be Hybrid-Hydrogen Combustion or Biodiesel if horsepower is a big factor.)


Also, recent studies have shown that the earth may not actually be producing more oil, so it's possible that even in 100 million years, we won't have any more oil. Apparently, oil might take very specific conditions to be formed, and those conditions were last present in the oxygen-rich environment from before the Triassic period, and ending in the Cretaceous.

So in the end, no matter how much you love it, we'll have to ditch oil soon. Sure, it's a useful thing, but the world will be better off when we've based society off other technologies and materials for a number of reasons.

 

[tkip]

Oil..........

This talk reminds me of the approaching reality that the entire planet (the portions that rely on oil anyway) face. Peak Oil.

No matter how you look at and whether its decades out or a few years down the road, sooner or later what's left in the ground won't be enough to power our civilzation anymore or rather to the extent it's currently powered. So what then? What alternatives can step in to replace it?

From all the stuff I've seen and read online would strongly suggest that nothing and no combination of alternatives can replace oil. So..... What happens then? I don't know and I really think no one out there has an answer to this who understands the nature of the problem.

Oh, well....... I have to go play Quakelive now.....

 

[Glen]

The value of oil is not its energy content, but rather its storage capacity.

Generating enough energy is easy, storing it is not.

 

[cdr108]

forget oil ... go BIO-fuel.

and it doesn't require the need to divert agricultural resources from human consumption to make.
algae is the way to go ... it's clean, quick and efficient.

 

[gristle]

Where's the nearest algae production plant?

 

[Second_in_pie]

This talk reminds me of the approaching reality that the entire planet (the portions that rely on oil anyway) face. Peak Oil.

No matter how you look at and whether its decades out or a few years down the road, sooner or later what's left in the ground won't be enough to power our civilzation anymore or rather to the extent it's currently powered. So what then? What alternatives can step in to replace it?

From all the stuff I've seen and read online would strongly suggest that nothing and no combination of alternatives can replace oil. So..... What happens then? I don't know and I really think no one out there has an answer to this who understands the nature of the problem.

Oh, well....... I have to go play Quakelive now.....

Oil is going to run out some time, that much is obvious. It's probably going to peak within the next 20 years, and some scientists think that it'll peak before 2012 (we could be at the peak right now!)

However, there's definitely enough energy to power the rest of the earth. There are tonnes of different things we could rely on in the future. Wind Turbines, Solar (for both industrial and household uses,) Hydro/Tidal generating stations, and Nuclear power. All of those except Nuclear power are natural and available in every country in the world.

This electricity could then be turned into Hydrogen, where farmers could use a mixture of extremely mechanized farming techniques and hydrogen powered vehicles to produce foods such as sugarcane that can both be turned into Ethanol and used for food. This would have to be managed by some higher-up body to make the best use of energy and such. As an example, U.S. Corn-based biodiesel is about 1.1 times more efficient than gas, but when you take into account the amount of fuel burned to produce it and the greenhouse gas emissions from burning the Biodiesel itself, energy is actually being lost. Brazilian Sugarcane Biodiesel is about 10 times as efficient when taking into account the gas used to produce it, and Sugar is also extracted in the process.

Building the mystical supergrid will actually be a very important project in the future for big countries like Canada, Russia, the U.S. and China. That way, renewable resource based electricity can be produced where it makes the most sense (where the winds blow, sun shines) and then to where it's needed.

I should probably stop my Global Warming/Alternative Energy rant now, or else this post's gonna be a page long. But the truth is, the world doesn't have to run on oil. Heck, we could even make it if we ran out of oil right now. But the earlier we start, the easier the transition is going to be. If anyone wants me to continue on my rant for extra information, I'd be glad to go on about all the alternatives and global mechanisms that we could easily harness to create a better future economy than we are with oil.

Good choice of game at least

 

[Roy G Biv]

I've actually seen workers dump the green bins right in with the garbage.

 

[laurie gordon]

The solution is simple. These weight targets for a full truck were set before the green bin program, so garbage was much denser. The city waste services should simply set new weight targets based on the average density of our current garbage. Or base the load targets on volume, not weight.

There is a separate problem about green bin composting capacity. The province has severely curtailed the operations of our two commercial composters due to health/environmental concerns.

To deal with such problems we should encourage several firms share the processing, not just a couple. a) Different inovations and efficiences can be developed, and b) the city is less vulnerable when a single operation is shut down.

Furthermore, we as trash producers must produce less waste, including green waste. With vermi-composting, virtually everyone can compost their own fruit and vegetable waste. Use diaper service (or wash your own) rather than disposable diapers; cloth napkins and handkerchiefs rather than paper serviettes and Kleenex, regular dishes rather than paper (or shudder plastic) ones, etc.

 

[UD2]

The solution is simple. These weight targets for a full truck were set before the green bin program, so garbage was much denser. The city waste services should simply set new weight targets based on the average density of our current garbage. Or base the load targets on volume, not weight.

There is a separate problem about green bin composting capacity. The province has severely curtailed the operations of our two commercial composters due to health/environmental concerns.

To deal with such problems we should encourage several firms share the processing, not just a couple. a) Different inovations and efficiences can be developed, and b) the city is less vulnerable when a single operation is shut down.

Furthermore, we as trash producers must produce less waste, including green waste. With vermi-composting, virtually everyone can compost their own fruit and vegetable waste. Use diaper service (or wash your own) rather than disposable diapers; cloth napkins and handkerchiefs rather than paper serviettes and Kleenex, regular dishes rather than paper (or shudder plastic) ones, etc.

1. Economies of scale. The weight requirement is not set by the type of load but the towing capacities of the trucks. Also, we're paying the American by the truck load, not tonnage, and therefore, not filling up is wasting tax payer's money.

2. It blows my mind why more people arn't investing in this sector.

3. But not everybody want to.

4. Cloth dipers? Too far.

 

[laurie gordon]

Disposable Diapers

From a Toronto Public Health bulletin, the estimated cost of diaper service is the same as for disposal diapers, about $1600 from birth to completion of toilet training. As far as the environmental impact, it says:

Diaper Service - When they wear out, the diaper services sell them for use as industrial rags. There is no extra load on landfill and the extra cost of laundering them is far less than the energy used in making "disposable" diapers.

"Disposable" Diapers - It's hard to think of anything that is more wasteful of our resources than "disposable" diapers. Every year, Toronto babies account for a million green garbage bags of soiled diapers, which cost $500,000 to pick up and take to landfill sites. It takes 30,000 trees and 450 tonnes of plastic each year to make "disposable" diapers for these Toronto babies.​

My wife and I used diaper service for all three of our children, and were very happy with the system.

 

[afransen]

From a Toronto Public Health bulletin, the estimated cost of diaper service is the same as for disposal diapers, about $1600 from birth to completion of toilet training. As far as the environmental impact, it says:

Diaper Service - When they wear out, the diaper services sell them for use as industrial rags. There is no extra load on landfill and the extra cost of laundering them is far less than the energy used in making "disposable" diapers.

"Disposable" Diapers - It's hard to think of anything that is more wasteful of our resources than "disposable" diapers. Every year, Toronto babies account for a million green garbage bags of soiled diapers, which cost $500,000 to pick up and take to landfill sites. It takes 30,000 trees and 450 tonnes of plastic each year to make "disposable" diapers for these Toronto babies.​

My wife and I used diaper service for all three of our children, and were very happy with the system.

And if there was a really high adoption rate among parents, cloth diaper service would probably be more cost effective.